The Science Surrounding Children Dogs Part 2 The Bad

I hope you had a Happy Thanksgiving Julie!

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I’m not exactly sure what that means, as we don’t celebrate it in Australia, but I hope you had a great time with your family and friends all the same!

Thanks for all those fantastic resources you included in your last blog post. It was also great to see some extras posted by readers in the comments section. 

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Last time I looked at ‘The Good’ of some the science surrounding children and dogs. This post, it’s time to cover some of the ‘The Bad’. 

What can possibly be bad about children and dogs? Well, dogs don’t live as long as us, for one.

When dogs die

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Having established last time that dogs can benefit kids’ confidence, self-belief, trust, respect and heaps of other positive attitudes and behaviours, I was left wondering how losing a pet dog impacts children. Loss of a companion animal can be a devastating event for people of any age.

Humans don’t all experience grief equally.

Our understanding of death is linked to our developmental state, but young children can still feel pain at the loss of a family dog. For many children, the death of a pet dog will be their first experience with this kind of loss and grief. Pet dogs can be almost-constant companions for children, and have been assigned a role in reflected appraisal similar to that of a best friend.

Psychologists encourage parents/guardians to explain death to kids sensitively and with honesty. Adults should answer questions simply, using clear and accurate information and avoid the desire to ‘protect’ children from death by hiding the truth of a pet’s illness or euthanasia. This is because children with active imaginations may create scenarios about the death that are far worse than reality. 

Adults should allow children to express their grief (through verbal, artistic or written expression; reading stories about the death of pets, etc.), acknowledging the importance of the relationship lost (rather than trivializing the death or running to buy a new puppy) and helping children to understand that grief is a normal and natural emotion that helps us cope with death.

Sometimes bad can be good

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Some psychologists believe that such trauma (with a successful associated recovery) can strengthen our capacity to deal with future stress and adversity. 

This is referred to as psychological resilience and is considered a desirable and healthy process as it enables a person, or in this case a child, to develop coping strategies and support networks (friends, adults, family, etc.) that will serve them in difficult times later in life.

Your dog is a zoo-

Zoo noses? (source)

Its true (when youre using zo/zoo- as a prefix to indicate animals are involved). And its about noses. Not noses-noses, that would be silly. Im talking about Zoonoses. As in diseases that can transfer from animals to people. As in from a dog to a child. Theyre not pretty. 

Research has shown that people can be generally uninformed about some of the most common zoonotic diseases (e.g. common roundworm eggs readily transfer between dogs and people; the worm larvae can decide to live in the back of childrens eyes which can lead to blindness - people should know that!)

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I suggest that if any of your dog-owning friends with children arent aware of the risks of zoonotic diseases, they run an online search for dogs zoonosis [insert country of residence] so they can read up on what parasite control and other measures can be used in their neck of the globe to reduce the risk of zoonoses. 

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Maintaining good child and dog health and hygiene should be a no-brainer. Did you know dogs can catch things from kids too? Thats called reverse zoonosis. 

And to think sharing is something I normally praise my toddler for!

I hope you’ll grit your teeth and stick with me for my third post about the science surrounding children and dogs. 

You’ve seen The Good and now The Bad – next time, Im going to bring out The Ugly. Ill also touch on what science has to say about our childhood experience with dogs influencing us as adults. 

What do you reckon your childhood experiences with Arf contributed to your adult attitudes?

Take care,

Mia

Further reading:

Gerwolls M.K. & Labott S.M. (1994). Adjustment to the Death of a Companion Animal, Anthrozoos: A Multidisciplinary Journal of The Interactions of People & Animals, 7 (3) 172-187. DOI: 10.2752/089279394787001826

Serpell J.A. (1981). Childhood Pets and their Influence on Adults Attitudes, Psychological Reports, 49 (2) 651-654. DOI: 10.2466/pr0.1981.49.2.651

Davis J.H. (1987). Preadolescent Self-Concept Development and Pet Ownership, Anthrozoos: A Multidisciplinary Journal of The Interactions of People & Animals, 1 (2) 90-94. DOI: 10.2752/089279388787058614

Van Houtte B.A. & Jarvis P.A. (1995). The role of pets in preadolescent psychosocial development, Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 16 (3) 463-479. DOI: 10.1016/0193-3973(95)90030-6

Bryant B.K. (1990). The Richness of the Child-Pet Relationship: A Consideration of Both Benefits and Costs of Pets to Children, Anthrozoos: A Multidisciplinary Journal of The Interactions of People & Animals, 3 (4) 253-261. DOI: 10.2752/089279390787057469

Kaufman K.R. & Kaufman N.D. (2006). And Then the Dog Died, Death Studies, 30 (1) 61-76. DOI: 10.1080/07481180500348811

Bonanno G.A. (2004). Loss, Trauma, and Human Resilience: Have We Underestimated the Human Capacity to Thrive After Extremely Aversive Events?, American Psychologist, 59 (1) 20-28. DOI: 10.1037/0003-066X.59.1.20

Bingham G.M., Budke C.M. & Slater M.R. (2010). Knowledge and perceptions of dog-associated zoonoses: Brazos County, Texas, USA, Preventive Veterinary Medicine, 93 (2-3) 211-221. DOI: 10.1016/j.prevetmed.2009.09.019

© Mia Cobb 2012

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Mixing kids dogs a how to resource list

Hi Mia, 

Friends for life is a wonderful way to describe growing from childhood to adulthood with a dog. For me, Arf was always around till a living, breathing dog came into my life, and you clearly thought dogs were the bomb from an early age! 

And speaking of childhood dogs, how awesome is the Childhood Dog Photo Challenge that you started over on Facebook? Were you expecting people to post photos of so many dogs and kids from all over the world!?

Mia and Star; Julie and Arf

Nowadays, I imagine you and I are in the same position: People contact us with questions when a new baby is on the way and Fido’s already in the house or someone’s adding a dog to a family that already includes a child.

When this happens, I get uber excited. You and I clearly have a similar passion -- sharing information and resources -- so when an inquiry like this comes in, I can imagine we both go into OVERDRIVE!

While dogs and kids seem to have "effortless" relationships with "unconditional love," I find myself reminding parents-to-be that there are a lot of nuances that can make or break the relationship (clearly, my relationship with Arf was highly successful and bidirectional). 

Theres so much to talk about when it comes to dogs and kids, and I tend to emphasize providing a dog with (1) a comfortable resting area and (2) space where a dog can choose to retreat from interactions. This is one of the main ideas I took away from my Masters program: there is a higher probability of good welfare and good interactions when animals have options and control. 

And I also pass out oodles of resources! Here are some resources pertaining to dogs and kids, including resources you shared with me from down under. Australia has great resources!

A Guide to Nurturing the Child and Pet Relationship from Pregnancy to Pre-school
The Department of Primary Industries, Victoria, Australia, put out this information, and it covers a lot, such as Preparation, The First Six Months and Baby on the Move. The strength of this guide is it reminds parents that new challenges arise at different stages of a child’s development. A dog’s perception of a newborn can change radically once that bugger starts moving around and grabbing onto anything and everything.

This website even has a Pet Planner Checklist that helps new parents prepare their dog, their house and themselves for a new baby. The checklist asks questions like: 

• Do you need to change their current feeding routine? 
• Which areas are going to be pet free zones?
• Can your pet be comfortable and relaxed spending short periods of time in a crate or confined space? 
• When the baby comes, have you organized someone to exercise the dog?

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APSCA Guide To Kids and Pets
I particularly like the age-appropriate Activities for Kids and Pets as well as the section, How Kids Respond to Pets. As you point out, a toddler might think they are hugging another child when in fact, theyve smashed the child to the ground, and toddlers can make the same mistake with dogs. Sometimes I think adults also have difficulty seeing their behavior for what it is and how it affects companion animals.

Family Paws
Family Paws is the parent organization of two international programs: Dogs & Storks and the Dog and Baby Connection. They offer programs for new and expecting families to support happy interactions among babies, toddlers and family dogs.
 
Their goal: “increase the safety of children and the success of dogs in homes with children. Decrease the number of dogs surrendered to shelters due to easily preventable behavioral problems and common conflicts.”
 
They offer trainer-run programs, DVDs and of course, a newsletter!

Animal Behavior Associates: Dog, Baby and Kid Resources
Dr. Suzanne Hetts and Dr. Dan Estep run Animal Behavior Associates. Both are Certified Applied Animal Behaviorists. They offer videos and DVDs for smooth interactions between dogs, babies and kids.

And this is just the tip of the iceberg. Are there other resources that anyones particularly fond of when it comes to dog, kids and babies?

Bye for now!

Julie

© Julie Hecht 2012

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