Refinement Database

Database on Refinement of Housing, Husbandry, Care, and Use of Animals in Research

This database, created in 2000, is updated every four months with newly published scientific articles, books, and other publications related to improving or safeguarding the welfare of animals used in research.

Tips for using the database:

  • This landing page displays all of the publications in the database.
  • Use the drop-down menus to filter these publications by Animal Type, Setting, and/or Topic.
  • Clicking on a parent category (e.g., Rodent) will include publications relating to all the items in that category (e.g., Chinchilla, Gerbil, Guinea Pig, etc.).
  • You may also add a keyword to further narrow your search.
  • Please note that at this time, only publications dated 2010 or later (with some exceptions) can be filtered by Animal Type and Topic, and only publications dated 2020 or later (with some exceptions) can be filtered by Setting. Most publications older than 2010 can only be searched by keyword. 
Watz, J. 2019. Structural complexity in the hatchery rearing environment affects activity, resting metabolic rate and post-release behaviour in brown trout Salmo trutta. Journal of Fish Biology 95(2), 638-641.

The effects of structural enrichment in the hatchery rearing environment of brown trout Salmo trutta was linked to post-release performance. Enrichment resulted in reduced swimming activity scored in an open field test and reduced movement...

Jones, C. T., Fransson, B. A. 2019. Evaluation of the effectiveness of preoperative administration of maropitant citrate and metoclopramide hydrochloride in preventing postoperative clinical gastroesophageal reflux in dogs. Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association 255(4), 437-445.

OBJECTIVE To investigate the prophylactic effectiveness of preoperative administration of maropitant citrate and metoclopramide hydrochloride in preventing postoperative clinical gastroesophageal reflux (GER) in dogs and to identify risk factors for clinical postoperative GER in dogs...

Gill, S. S., Buote, N. J., Peterson, N. W. et al. 2019. Factors associated with dehiscence and mortality rates following gastrointestinal surgery in dogs. Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association 255(5), 569-573.

OBJECTIVE To identify factors associated with dehiscence and mortality rates following gastrointestinal surgery in dogs. ANIMALS 170 client-owned dogs that underwent gastrointestinal surgery from 2010 to 2016. PROCEDURES Medical records of all included dogs were...

Powell, L., Guastella, A. J., McGreevy, P. et al. 2019. The physiological function of oxytocin in humans and its acute response to human-dog interactions: A review of the literature. Journal of Veterinary Behavior 30, 25-32.

Oxytocin is increasingly recognized to have a role in human-dog bonding and interactions and a positive influence on various health outcomes including cardiovascular function and stress reactivity. This review summarizes current research investigating human-dog interactions...

Lensen, C. M. M., Moons, C. P. H., Diederich, C. 2015. Saliva sampling in dogs: How to select the most appropriate procedure for your study. Journal of Veterinary Behavior 10(6), 504-512.

Saliva sampling is an easy, noninvasive method to assess short-term physiological changes, and as such is a valuable addition to behavioral studies in dogs. Different methods for collecting saliva samples in dogs have been reported...

Range, F., Kassis, A., Taborsky, M. et al. 2019. Wolves and dogs recruit human partners in the cooperative string-pulling task. Scientific Reports, 9(1), 17591.

In comparison to non-human animals, humans are highly flexible in cooperative tasks, which may be a result of their ability to understand a partner’s role in such interactions. Here, we tested if wolves and dogs...

Sundman, A. S., Van Poucke, E., Svensson Holm, A. C. et al. 2019. Long-term stress levels are synchronized in dogs and their owners. Scientific Reports 9, 7391.

This study reveals, for the first time, an interspecific synchronization in long-term stress levels. Previously, acute stress has been shown to be highly contagious both among humans and between individuals of other species. Here, long-term...

Message, R., Greenhough, B. 2019. “But it’s just a fish”: Understanding the challenges of applying the 3Rs in laboratory aquariums in the UK. Animals 9(12), 1075.

Adopting a social science perspective and qualitative methodology on the problem of laboratory fish welfare, this paper examines some underlying social factors and drivers that influence thinking, priorities and implementation of fish welfare initiatives and...

Mather, J. A. 2019. Ethics and care: For animals, not just mammals. Animals 9(12), 1018.

Animals come in a huge array of types, species and structures, but without realizing it, we have focused our care on those like us, mammals. They look something like us, so it's easy to empathize...

Phillips, K.A., Tukan, A. N., Rigodanzo, A. D. et al. 2018. Quantification of hair cortisol concentration in common marmosets (Callithrix jacchus) and tufted capuchins (Cebus apella). American Journal of Primatology 80(7), e22879.

Quantifying cortisol concentration in hair is a non‐invasive biomarker of long‐term hypothalamic‐pituitary‐adrenal (HPA) activation, and thus can provide important information on laboratory animal health. Marmosets (Callithrix jacchus) and capuchins (Cebus apella) are New World primates...

Protopopova, A., Hauser, H., Goldman, K. J. et al. 2018. The effects of exercise and calm interactions on in-kennel behavior of shelter dogs. Behavioural Processes 146, 54-60.

Over-activity, or excessive locomotion and barking in the kennel, may be unattractive to adopters and an indicator of poor welfare of kenneled dogs. The study assessed the efficacy of two common enrichment strategies, providing calm...

McGowan, R. T. S., Bolte, C., Barnett, H. R. et al. 2018. Can you spare 15?min? The measurable positive impact of a 15-min petting session on shelter dog well-being. Applied Animal Behaviour Science 203, 42-54.

It is well established that human interaction has positive effects on shelter dogs. This work set out to answer the question: “Does one 15-min petting session make a difference for shelter dogs?” Fifty-five dogs were...

González-Pech, P. G., Marín-Tun, C. G., Valladares-González, D.A. et al. 2018. A protocol of human animal interaction to habituate young sheep and goats for behavioural studies. Behavioural Processes 157, 632-637.

Animal habituation is key to obtain reliable data on behavioural studies but detailed procedures to achieve it are scarce. This study designed a set of actions to habituate sheep and goats to human observers. Pelibuey...

Nawroth C., Albuquerque N., Savalli C. et al. 2018. Goats prefer positive human emotional facial expressions. Royal Society Open Science 5(8), 180491.

Domestication has shaped the physiology and the behaviour of animals to better adapt to human environments. Therefore, human facial expressions may be highly informative for animals domesticated for working closely with people, such as dogs...

Mariti, C., Carlone, B., Protti, M. et al. 2018. Effects of petting before a brief separation from the owner on dog behavior and physiology: A pilot study. Journal of Veterinary Behavior 27, 41-46.

Human physical contact is known to be effective in decreasing dogs' level of stress, assessed through endocrine, physiological, and behavioral parameters. Gentle touching has been found to be beneficial for dogs while experiencing or after...

Regan, D., Garcia, K., Thamm, D. 2018. Clinical, pathological, and ethical considerations for the conduct of clinical trials in dogs with naturally occurring cancer: A comparative approach to accelerate translational drug development. ILAR Journal 59(1), 99-110.

The role of comparative oncology in translational research is receiving increasing attention from drug developers and the greater biomedical research community. Pet dogs with spontaneous cancer are important and underutilized translational models, owing to dogs’...

Döring, D., Nick, O., Bauer, A. et al. 2017. How do rehomed laboratory Beagles behave in everyday situations? Results from an observational test and a survey of new owners. PLOS ONE 12(7), e0181303.

When laboratory dogs are rehomed into private households, they experience an extreme change in their life situation. They leave their familiar, limited environment in the research facility and encounter a multitude of animate and inanimate...

Quadarella, M. A., Kundu, M. C., Alderfer, T. K. et al. 2016. Laboratory Animal Science Professional 4(4) (December), 47-49.

Our goal was to improve dog socialization by increasing novel human interactions, while also providing non-animal care staff opportunity to interact with the dogs. Our volunteer dog socialization program was developed to explore the possibility...

Horowitz, A., Hecht, J. 2016. Examining dog–human play: The characteristics, affect, and vocalizations of a unique interspecific interaction. Animal Cognition 19(4), 779–788.

Despite the growing interest in research on the interaction between humans and dogs, only a very few research projects focus on the routines between dogs and their owners. In this study, we investigated one such...

Kiddie, J., Collins, L. 2015. Identifying environmental and management factors that may be associated with the quality of life of kenneled dogs (Canis familiaris). Applied Animal Behaviour Science 167, 43-55.

This paper describes the use of a validated quality of life assessment tool (described elsewhere) to identify environmental and management factors that may affect quality of life in dogs kennelled in rehoming centres. Dogs were...

Caron, A., Lelong, C., Pascual, M. H. et al. 2015. Miniaturized blood sampling techniques to benefit reduction in mice and refinement in nonhuman primates: Application to bioanalysis in toxicity studies with antibody-drug conjugates. JAALAS 54(2), 145-152.

Minimizing the number of animals in regulatory toxicity studies while achieving study objectives to support the development of future medicines contributes to good scientific and ethical practices. Recent advances in technology have enabled the development...

Bayne, K. A., Beaver, B. V., Mench, J. A. et al. 2015. Laboratory animal behavior. In: Laboratory Animal Medicine, 3rd edition. Fox, J. G., Anderson, L., Otto, G., et al. (eds). Elsevier, Inc., Amsterdam, NL. pp. 1617-1651.

The study of laboratory animal behavior has increased steadily over the last decade, with expanding emphasis on a variety of commonly used species. In the United States, this trend was initially focused on species for...

Zenithson, Y. G., Pierce, B. J., Otto, C. M. et al. 2014. The effect of dog-human interaction on cortisol and behavior in registered animal-assisted activity dogs. Applied Animal Behaviour Science. 159, 69-81.

The effect of animal-assisted activities (AAA) on the animal participants has been minimally investigated, and the welfare of these animals has been questioned. To enhance our understanding of these animals’ welfare, we measured cortisol collected...

Flink, K., Castonguay, S. 2014. From the kennel to the couch: The transition of dogs from research to home. American Association for Laboratory Animal Science [AALAS] Meeting Official Program, 540 (Abstract #PS57).

Adoption of research dogs to private homes is increasingly common; however, the transition can be stressful. Our teaching dog program prepares former laboratory dogs for adoption by introducing challenges experienced in a home setting. All...

Piccione, G., Arfuso, F., Giannetto, C. et al. 2013. Effect of housing conditions and owner's schedule on daily total locomotor activity in dogs (Canis familiaris). Biological Rhythm Research 44, 778-786.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the influence of housing conditions on daily rhythm of total locomotor activity in dogs. Seven clinically healthy dogs (Canis familiaris) were used and divided into two groups...