Dr. Jacqui Ley is a Registered Specialist in Veterinary Behavioural Medicine (Veterinary Psychiatrist). She currently sees behaviour cases at the Melbourne Veterinary Specialist Centre. She also trains veterinarians, veterinary nurses, and dog trainers to recognise normal and abnormal behaviour in domestic and non-domestic species. She is passionate about helping owners and pet carers to understand mental health and mental health disorders in animals. Her PhD, undertaken in Psychology at Monash University, resulted in a model of canine personality and the Monash Canine Personality Questionnaire – revised (MCPQ-R). Researchers around the world are using this to measure canine personality. 

She also continues her research with projects looking at quantifying normal animal behaviour, identifying how animals with mental health disorders differ from normal animals in their behaviour and pharmacological studies. She has special interests in aggression management in all species, obsessive-compulsive disorders, psychopharmacology and raising community awareness of animal mental health. She has also contributed several chapters to veterinary textbooks in behaviour and behaviour management and published a book “The Veterinary Psychiatry of Cats.”