Why take part?

By taking part you and your dog will help improve our knowledge of the factors that influence the development of tail chasing or spinning behaviour. Understanding these factors may result in earlier detection and intervention for dogs at risk of developing these behaviours. Your involvement will also help us understand what spinning or tail chasing tells us about dog welfare. Ultimately this will help improve the lives of dogs.

We are looking for dogs to join one of these two groups:

Spinning/tail chasing group	Control group
Your dog must spin in circles or chase its tail repeatedly You must be able to video your dog spinning or tail chasing Your dog must be fit and healthy	Your dog must not display spinning or tail chasing behaviour  Your dog must not displaying any other type of abnormal repetitive behaviour Your dog must be fit and healthy

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What might your involvement include?

If you choose to help us with this project, your involvement may include the following:

• Filling out a questionnaire about your dog
• Allowing two researchers to visit you in your home to complete 3 training tasks with your dog (all involve food rewards!)
• Collection of a urine sample and a cheek swab from your dog. The cheek swab is a soft cotton bud that we wipe around your dog’s cheek.
• Videoing your dog displaying spinning or tail chasing behaviour (if your dog is part of the spinning / tail chasing group)

Not all dogs will be suitable to be visited by the researchers, but if this is the case, we appreciate your involvement with other parts of the project.

Confidentiality and data protection

In order to arrange to visit you and your dog, or to send you a questionnaire to fill out, we ask you to supply your name and email address. This information will not be used for any other purpose and will be held securely in line with the University of Bristol’s policy on data protection.

We are now recruiting

Please email Beth and Sarah on the email address spinningdog-study@bristol.ac.uk to find out how you can get involved. 

Keep up to date via facebook (Bristol Dog Spinning Study)