Stress resilience is the ability to effectively respond to stress. In humans, higher levels of stress resilience are associated with decreased susceptibility to mental health disorders. Poor stress resilience is associated with mental and physical health concerns and decreased quality of life. Basically, stress resilience is key to living a good life. Dogs that have… Continue reading Building resilience: effort, reward, and stress coping
Currently, the primary way of addressing fear in dogs is through the use of desensitization and counter conditioning. For this month’s blog post, I am going to spend some time digging into the details of what counter conditioning is, how it functions, and what its limitations are. Counter conditioning refers to the process of… Continue reading Making the most of counter conditioning
Group cohesion, affiliation, and being in sync This month I’ll be focusing on social relationships between dogs, both in this blog post and in the Research Bites webinar. Dogs are social animals. They live in groups – either with other people or with other people and dogs (or other animals). In order for groups… Continue reading Assessing affiliation between dogs
The benefits of appropriate challenge We talk about enrichment in the dog world all the time. How important is it, really? It turns out that it’s very important! In fact, the very definition of enrichment states that it improves animal welfare and wellbeing. Today I am going to focus on the topic of cognitive enrichment,… Continue reading I challenge you – the relationship between enrichment, challenge, and wellbeing
Leena barks, lunges and generally loses her mind when she sees other dogs on a walk. Her owner and I are walking in the park so I can teach the owner how to change Leena’s behavior. When we see another dog at a distance, Leena freezes and her head comes up, mouth closed. She’s about… Continue reading Lost in Translation: Sorting through commonly confused learning terms
Hello everyone! It’s been quite some time since I’ve posted, but I have been busily working on a new project behind the scenes. I am thrilled to announce the launch of Research Bites this coming January 2020! What is Research Bites? Finding, reading and interpreting current journal articles can be overwhelming and frustrating. Research Bites… Continue reading Research Bites – Coming in January!
You may have heard that dogs “lip lick” or “tongue flick” when they are stressed. A recent study by Albuquerque et al. (2018) used lip licking in dogs to assess their ability to respond to emotional cues in humans and dogs. Previous research suggests that dogs can differentiate between happy and angry facial expressions in… Continue reading How do your emotions affect your dog?
This week, Finn found his teeth. That means we’ve been doing some work on settle and impulse control. I am also continuing to work on socialization, loose leash walking and handling. In my posts I focus on the training we are doing as well as the issues he’s having and how I’ve been addressing them.… Continue reading Journey of Finn – Are You a Puppy or a Piranha?
(I am taking a break this month from talking about getting a new dog. Instead, I’m going to use this time to talk about my personal journey with my dog, Darwin, in the hopes that it will be beneficial to others as well.) I’ve been working hard on embracing failure lately for a number of… Continue reading The Evolution of Darwin
Last month, I talked about choosing the right breed in part 1 of my series on “Starting off on the Right Paw”. This month I will talk about finding a good breeder. If you choose to get a purebred puppy, finding a responsible and knowledgeable breeder is key to bringing home a puppy that will… Continue reading Starting off on the Right Paw – Part 2: Choosing a good breeder
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