← Feed
@just2look@lemmy.zip
Post #617853
2026-03-10 21:35 UTC
One issue with studies like this is that people are really bad at identifying dog breeds, and that includes experts like veterinarians.
“Two ancillary findings, however, were that the second (F2) generation of the Cocker Spaniel–Basenji crosses took a “great variety of form and color” and that none of the 72 F2-generation puppies closely resembled either parental breed.”
“More recently, Voith et al compared, for dogs from multiple shelter locations, results of breed identification made on the basis of visual inspection alone with results of DNA analysis of breed. Although the number of dogs was small, the major breed determined on the basis of visual inspection matched the predominant breed identified by means of DNA analysis for only 25% of the dogs. This suggests that there is a high potential that results of visual identification of breed for shelter dogs of unknown lineage will differ from results of DNA analysis.”
So unless they identified them with breed papers or genetic testing, the breed identification is suspect at best. Not to say the results would be wrong, just that it needs more definitive study.
Replies (2)
-
This is definitely the fairest point in favor of pit bulls. That being said, even rampant misidentification toward pit bulls wouldn’t be enough to offset 51% – a straight majority – of identified dogs being the perpetrators when 70% of victims knew the dog. At worst, assuming it somehow did, that would suggest “dogs that most people would perceive as pit bulls are more aggressive than other dogs not perceived as pit bulls”.
In fact, because of the immense stigma associated with pit bulls, shelters have been found to intentionally misidentify them to make them more adoptable.
Open ##618038
-
Trying to pin down a DNA makeup to blame doesn’t really make sense when people who breed these pit bulls dogs that are colloquially recognized as pit bulls don’t really care about their DNA makeup.
Open ##619226