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Yuritci Martinez

Dr. Shariy Nelson

English 1302 -101

5 December 2022

Dogs decrease stress and anxiety from students

Introduction

Students face new situations as well as social, academic, and emotional obstacles

associated with university life. They are more likely to experience challenges during their first

year to last year of school or college as they learn to adjust to and manage their new obligations.

As a result, students begin to experience psychological problems such as anxiety and depression

because of failure to complete homework on time or failing an exam, or in other situations it may

be more complex, such as having to study for multiple classes at a time or missing a deadline for

several homework assignments or tests. Assumpcao, et al. stated that “50.2% of the students said

that handling academics was extremely tough, and 33.2% said that stress was the main cause of

their poor performance on a test, project, or course” (1). Accordingly, students who spend more

time with a dog may find it easier and convenient to focus while studying and completing their

coursework for a longer period as proved by the experiment performed and discussed further. As

per the study performed with brief dog-assisted therapy on university students, it was “shown

that even with a time limited intervention spending time with dogs can reduce both perceived

stress (state anxiety inventory) and biological markers of stress (blood pressure) in University

students” (Wood et al., 1). With this study along with the experiment performed it was proven

that dogs may calm down students who are struggling with their academics.
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This experiment will investigate if dogs may help students who are stressed or anxious.

By comparing the amount of time university students can focus with and without the dog. It is

crucial to determine whether a dog will assist in reducing a student’s tension and anxiety. In each

course, we'll keep track of how much time a student can spend doing assignments and studying.

Furthermore, having a dog close by will help students who struggle with stress and anxiety feel

more relaxed and confident thus increasing their concentration and productivity time. In Wood,

et al., “The participants showed statistically significant reduction in systolic and diastolic blood

pressure and in state anxiety” (1). The goal of this study is to comprehend how a dog can help a

university student who is stressed and anxious.

Methods/Explanation

To find out how a dog may assist students in reducing tension and anxiety, a four-day

study experiment was carried out. Four days of the trial, from Saturday through Tuesday, were

spent completing various tasks associated with college. Different tasks were finished every day.

A participant, being a university student, and a Yorkshire Terrier were both included in the

experiment. The participant was a female student in her late teens. A homework component, a

studying section, and a test section were among the college-related responsibilities. By

monitoring the participant (the university student) it was checked if she was biting nails, getting

nervous, having inability to focus, having headaches, or having difficulty sleeping. The

researcher was taking notes to determine whether the student was experiencing stress and

anxiety. She utilized a notepad, a timer, and a planner to record all the information of the

experiment. The dog was present for two of the four days, sitting at the participant's side, and

was removed for the other two, which the participant was either studying, doing homework, or

taking a test.
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A total of four trials were completed, one each day in which the student engaged in a

different activity. The researcher recorded the findings by taking notes of the movements or

actions the participant did, while doing different university related activities. The researcher

recorded if the participant was acting nervous, biting nails, sweating, getting distracted, having

headaches, or sleepy for each day of the experiment. The participant spent the first day studying

for a music class exam, which was taken on Saturday with the dog at her side. On the second

day, the participant was working on a history class assignment alone without the dog being

present. On the third day, the participant worked on English class homework while the dog was

in the room with the student. The individual studied and took the PSYC class test without the

dog on the fourth day. On the first and third days, it was examined if the dog reduced the

student's tension and anxiety as the participant completed her schoolwork and studied for the

exam. It was examined whether the student could focus and do well on studying, taking the test,

and doing homework without the dog around. This was calculated based on how many activities

(tests, study sessions, and homework) the student completed and how long it took her to do so.

Day 1: Day 2: Day 4:

Day 3:
Student needed to Student needed to Student needs to
Student needs to do
study and complete do history class study and do the
English class
Music class test with homework without Psych class test
homework with dog.
dog's presence. dog. without dog.

Result

The study findings were based on an analysis of the data that enabled the researcher to

evaluate the study's hypotheses, which revealed that students and participants who engaged in

physical contact with dogs showed signs of lower tension, stress, and anxiety thus helping with

increasing focus time. As stated Meints et al. that “Human interaction and animal interventions

have found beneficial effects on health and wellbeing in adults and children” (2). The research
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findings revealed that the student's stress and anxiety levels were lower on the days when the dog

was present while studying and doing her assignments. The student studied and took an exam in

presence of the dog on the first day. The participant was able to focus more since her tension and

anxiety levels were low. She had 25 minutes to focus on studying and another 25 minutes to

finish the test. The student struggled to focus for a long time while doing schoolwork the second

day without the dog. She could barely focus for around fifteen minutes. The participant was

showing signs of anxiety when she was doing schoolwork. She was biting her nails and she

couldn’t fully concentrate for a long time. On the third day, the student worked on her

assignments with the dog, and a significant improvement was shown because of her anxiety and

stress levels dropping and her ability to focus increasing. She was able to focus fully for 35

minutes finishing her homework without biting her nails. The student was only able to focus and

study for a complete 10 minutes without the dog on the final day of the investigation. She was

only able to focus on a test without the dog for a total of 15 minutes before being sidetracked.

The participant couldn’t concentrate for too much and she would have breaks between because

her anxiety was getting higher. After she was done, she was complaining of having a headache

and was anxious about her test results.

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Student anxiety and stress Chart

45
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
Day 1 w/Dog Day 2 Day 3 w/Dog Day 4

Study Test Homework

Discussion

The goal of the study was to ascertain whether associating with a dog would have a

beneficial effect on a college student who was stressed and anxious. According to this study,

when the student engaged with the dog for two days out of four, their productivity time

significantly increased, and their levels of stress and anxiety were drastically reduced. As

Jalongo et al. stated that “95% of the student participants considered interaction with the therapy

dogs to be a means of stress reduction” (255). Overall, the results of this study support previous

research that is cited in this essay, which shows that dogs can boost students' productivity while

reducing stress and anxiety. The experiment was limited by the fact that it wasn't carried out in a

completely controlled setting because of the effects of the time of day, different activities

accomplished for various courses, and the time to execute those tasks. The next experiment

would be to determine if having a dog around is more beneficial than harmful. In other words, if

the dog adds more distraction than aid to a university student's life.
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Works cited

Assumpcao, Alessandra, et al. "Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy for University students with

depression, anxiety, and stress symptoms: a randomized controlled trial." Asia Pacific

Journal of Clinical Trials: Nervous System Diseases, vol. 4, no. 3, July-Sept. 2019, p.

51. Gale Health and Wellness, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A596382640/HWRC?

u=txshracd2563&sid=bookmark-HWRC&xid=24f0cb96. Accessed 12 Sept. 2022.

Jalongo, Mary Renck, and Theresa McDevitt. “Therapy Dogs in Academic Libraries: A Way to

Foster Student Engagement and Mitigate Self-Reported Stress during Finals.” Public

Services Quarterly, vol. 11, no. 4, 2015, pp. 254–269.,

https://doi.org/10.1080/15228959.2015.1084904. 

Meints, Kerstin, et al. “Can Dogs Reduce Stress Levels in School Children? Effects of Dog-

Assisted Interventions on Salivary Cortisol in Children with and without Special

Educational Needs Using Randomized Controlled Trials.” (“Can dogs reduce stress levels

in school children? effects of dog ...”) PLOS ONE, vol. 17, no. 6, 2022,

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0269333. 

Wood, Emily, et al. “The Feasibility of Brief Dog-Assisted Therapy on University Students

Stress Levels: The Paws Study.” Journal of Mental Health, vol. 27, no. 3, 2017, pp. 263–

268., https://doi.org/10.1080/09638237.2017.1385737.