Our anxiety affects our relationships with people, but also with dogs. That is the finding of a British study that casts a different light on human-dog communication.
Do you suffer from anxiety? Are you often stressed? The problem doesn't only affect your relationship with yourself and the people around you, but also your relationship with your dog — and, above all, with dogs you don't know. That is the finding of a recent study conducted in the county of Cheshire, England, whose results are reported in a paper published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health. The data suggest that certain factors put some people at greater risk than others when interacting with dogs, encouraging aggressive behaviour on the animals' part.
Researchers at the University of Liverpool gathered accounts from 694 people across 385 households in a semi-rural area of England, located in the predominantly agricultural county of Cheshire. The scientists asked participants whether they owned a dog, whether they had ever been bitten, whether or not they knew the animal that had bitten them, and whether the resulting wound had required medical treatment. The researchers then used a test to assess the participants' personalities — specifically the "Ten Item Personality Inventory" (TIPI) — to measure aspects such as extraversion, emotional stability, conscientiousness, openness to new experiences and agreeableness, with a particular focus on anxiety and stress, even when occasional.
By cross-referencing the collected data with the personality test results of those examined, the British study revealed an association between emotional stability and the risk of being bitten by dogs. In particular, being emotionally more stable (or less neurotic) was associated with a lower risk of attack both from one's own dogs and — even more so — from unfamiliar animals. This finding is partly consistent with certain studies, the researchers explain, which suggest that nervous, anxious owners often have nervous, anxious dogs in turn, and which may help explain the heightened risk of bites in dangerous situations.
But what exactly is anxiety? And what is stress? "Anxiety is a state of agitation or worry about something one fears may happen," explains Maria Chiara Verderi, counsellor and teacher at the Bach Centre. "Stress, on the other hand, is our body's response to destabilising events, and occurs when a person has to face a given situation but does not have — or does not believe they have — the resources to do so."
The British study was conducted in a small area and without taking into account sex, age or breed of dog. It nonetheless represents a valuable starting point for addressing the issue of communication between humans and animals. It also provides an opportunity, in the light of the data gathered, to reconsider the mistaken beliefs that underlie the relationship between the so-called aggressive dog and humans. The influence of people's anxious states on animals, in fact, often determines their aggressive or unusually stressed behaviour. According to the British study, then, the problem lies with the human being and never with the four-legged animal.
Life for those who suffer from anxiety is certainly not easy, and the existential difficulty that an anxious person faces every day has an impact on the people around them and on the animals they live with. It is no coincidence that anxious people often find themselves dealing with the stress that comes with keeping a pet, with its daily care and training. It is indeed a fact that anxious people more often than not have stressed and nervous dogs — prime candidates for the behavioural support of dog trainers and behaviourists. Everyday stress is therefore never a good ally when it comes to our relationships with the world around us.
"Since, when we are living under stress, our body prepares to face the event deemed threatening through physical changes (increased blood pressure and heart rate, muscular tension, hormone secretion, etc.), in order to manage these events more effectively and in agreement with one's own doctor, certain physical techniques specifically designed to discharge all those components that have accumulated in our bodies and are making us unwell can be taken into consideration," Maria Chiara Verderi continues. Anxiety and stress are without doubt "social illnesses", but a great deal can be done to alleviate their impact or to keep the resulting symptoms under control.
"Bioenergetics, for example, is a technique based on the work of Alexander Lowen, an American physician and psychotherapist and a pupil of Wilhelm Reich, who was himself a pupil of Sigmund Freud," Verderi continues. "Reich postulated the functional identity between people's character and their bodily attitude. According to Reich, painful and negative emotional experiences perceived as threatening by the child impose on the body a pattern of muscular tensions for protective purposes which, over time, become chronic. Lowen expanded on his teacher's work and developed Bioenergetic Analysis, integrating Freud's studies on character with an attention to somatic aspects in the analytical process."
In the wide range of remedies for stress and anxiety, Bach Flowers also feature — which, "if recommended by competent and reliable practitioners, can help to rebalance emotional states disturbed by the events of everyday life," the expert assures. "For problems of this kind, Counselling is also indicated: with a limited number of sessions, it can help to recover one's own psychological resources during difficult moments."
But even without resorting to specific therapies, nature around us can offer some help. Any form of physical activity, for example, is recommended for anxious and stressed people, provided it does not itself become yet another invitation to performance and discipline. "There is also important research," concludes Maria Chiara Verderi, "on the usefulness of techniques derived from meditation, such as guided visualisations or Mindfulness, for helping to gain distance from, or to establish brief pauses from, the overwhelming demands of our daily lives."
One final suggestion as spring and summer approach? Some lovely walks in nature with our four-legged friend — but also a little time at a dog park, or in the gardens near home — are undoubtedly a remedy for this kind of psychological malaise. And, with stress banished and anxiety kept at bay, our relationship with animals will benefit too.