Who rests with whom? Sex composition and group demography shape resting associations in free-ranging dogs
- 1Indian Institute of Science Education and Research-kolkata
Abstract
Free-ranging dogs frequently rest near conspecifics, but the demographic factors structuring their resting associations remain poorly understood. We quantified dyadic resting associations in 26 free-ranging dog groups in West Bengal, India, observed between 2019 and 2023. Association strength was estimated from scan based resting co-occurrences using the Half-Weight Index. We tested whether dyadic association strength varied with dyad sex composition, dyad life stage composition, group size, and group sex ratio using a generalised additive model for location, scale and shape that accounted for group identity and repeated occurrence of individuals across dyads. Male-male dyads had lower association strengths than female-female dyads, whereas mixed-sex dyads did not differ from female-female dyads. Association strength decreased with increasing group size but increased as the male-to-female ratio within the group increased, while life-stage composition had no detectable effect. Individual level network metrics, including strength, reach, clustering coefficient, affinity, and eigenvector centrality, did not vary with sex or season. Mixed-sex pairs were also frequently represented among the strongest dyadic associations within groups. These findings indicate that resting associations in free-ranging dogs vary with dyad sex composition and group demography. Further opportunity-controlled analyses are required to determine whether the prominence of mixed-sex dyads reflects preferential association rather than group composition alone.
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BibTeX
@misc{biswas2026rests,
title = {{Who rests with whom? Sex composition and group demography shape resting associations in free-ranging dogs}},
author = {S. Biswas and K. Ghosh and K. Sarkar and A. Bhadra},
howpublished = {bioRxiv},
year = {2026},
month = aug,
doi = {10.64898/2026.08.28.745223},
url = {https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.08.28.745223v1},
note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Who rests with whom? Sex composition and group demography shape resting associations in free-ranging dogs
AU - S. Biswas
AU - K. Ghosh
AU - K. Sarkar
AU - A. Bhadra
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/08/28
PB - bioRxiv
DO - 10.64898/2026.08.28.745223
UR - https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.08.28.745223v1
AB - Free-ranging dogs frequently rest near conspecifics, but the demographic factors structuring their resting associations remain poorly understood. We quantified dyadic resting associations in 26 free-ranging dog groups in West Bengal, India, observed between 2019 and 2023. Association strength was estimated from scan based resting co-occurrences using the Half-Weight Index. We tested whether dyadic association strength varied with dyad sex composition, dyad life stage composition, group size, and group sex ratio using a generalised additive model for location, scale and shape that accounted for group identity and repeated occurrence of individuals across dyads. Male-male dyads had lower association strengths than female-female dyads, whereas mixed-sex dyads did not differ from female-female dyads. Association strength decreased with increasing group size but increased as the male-to-female ratio within the group increased, while life-stage composition had no detectable effect. Individual level network metrics, including strength, reach, clustering coefficient, affinity, and eigenvector centrality, did not vary with sex or season. Mixed-sex pairs were also frequently represented among the strongest dyadic associations within groups. These findings indicate that resting associations in free-ranging dogs vary with dyad sex composition and group demography. Further opportunity-controlled analyses are required to determine whether the prominence of mixed-sex dyads reflects preferential association rather than group composition alone.
ER -