Family dog services provide a range of services that help your pet thrive in their new role. These include training, socialization and health care. Our research shows that children who are involved in active play with the family dog and go on regular walks with their pet are more likely to be healthy and develop positive social-emotional behaviors early in childhood.
Training
Family dog services can offer a variety of training options to help ensure your dog has the skills and confidence to interact with other people, pets, and environments. These include classes and private sessions. One of the benefits of family dog training is that all members of the household can be involved in training their own dogs. This can be a great way to teach children skills that will help them become responsible dog owners in the future.
This program focuses on puppy socialization and obedience, including leash manners, impulse control, and more. In addition, it teaches the skills that make a shelter or foster dog more attractive to potential adopters. Kim Brophey is an Applied Ethologist and owner of The Dog Door Behavior Center in Asheville, NC. She brings an empathetic and scientific approach to dog-people interactions and has garnered international attention for her work. She created this course to give you & the families you serve comprehensive understandings and interventions that will transform your work!
Socialization
Socialization is the process of preparing your dog to enjoy interactions with people, animals, places and things. It can take time, but it is essential for the well-being of your pet. During their “sensitive period,” which is from 3 to 14 weeks of age for puppies and from 3 to 9 weeks of age for kittens, it’s a good idea to introduce them to other dogs (if they have one), cats, different kinds of people, environments and activities. Ideally, these introductions should take place in a well-managed puppy or kitten socialization class.
Another helpful source of socialization is doggie daycare and boarding facilities. These businesses offer a safe environment for your dog to interact with other dogs and with people in an environment that is supervised by professionals.
Health
As a result of enhancing the human-animal bond, boosting the immune system, increasing social interactions, and reducing stress levels, dogs offer families an array of health benefits. For example, studies have shown that pet owners are more likely to participate in regular exercise and engage in healthy eating habits.
In addition, studies have found that dogs improve the quality of life for their owners by reducing their need for medical services. For example, research has shown that elderly people who own pets have a lower risk of depression and less anxiety.
In addition to improving the overall health of family members, the best way to make use of a service dog is to incorporate them into family activities. This includes taking the dog for a walk, playing fetch, and other canine-friendly outdoor activities. A recent study found that a family dog can play a key role in helping children with disabilities to incorporate more physical activity into their daily lives.
Read More: perfect dogs
Behavior
Family dog services offer a variety of solutions for addressing common behavior problems such as resource guarding, jumping on people, begging for food, clingy behavior and more. Training programs can be tailored for the entire family and include games that make learning fun.
Children from dog-owning households had reduced odds of conduct problems, peer problems, total difficulties, and higher prosocial behaviors than children from non-dog-owning families (Table 1). Within dog-owning households, walking with the family dog at least once a week decreased the odds of having poor total SDQ scores.
Moreover, active play with the dog three or more times a week increased the odds of prosocial behaviors in children from dog-owning households. This suggests that children from dog-owning households experience positive social-emotional development at an early age. This is the first study to examine this relationship in pre-schoolers. Despite these findings, further research is needed to understand the exact mechanisms through which family dog ownership may facilitate improved child behavioral outcomes.
