Therapy dogs helping students mental health
For those of you lucky enough to have grown up with a family pet, you’ll know how depressing it can be when they’re not around. Students are known to have naturally poor mental health, and not having a furry friend to cuddle with just adds to the problem. However, there may be a solution. ‘Pet therapy’ is on the rise in facilities all around the world - including Massey University - and is known to boost happy hormones, reduce stress, and improve our overall health and wellbeing.
Ann Evans from Canine Friends Pet Therapy says, “We just can’t believe the difference. Students come in with solemn faces, all stressed because it’s study week, and they leave happy as and willing to face the day. It’s unreal the difference that a four-legged dog has on you.”
Dogs have proven to lower blood pressure through touch and contact, which in turn helps to calm emotions and reduce anxiety symptoms. Therapy Dogs New Zealand writes, “While a therapy dog is unable to change the circumstances and make everything okay, the dog is a present, available, and reliable source of comfort and companionship. They have an instinctive way of knowing who needs their attention and affection.”
Requesting time with a therapy dog is simple. Ann Evans says, “We have a website, caninefriends.org.nz, and on it you can request a visit. Anybody can ask, and if we can do the visit then we will. We have just recently visited Massey University in Palmerston North.”
To request a therapy dog visit on a Massey campus, seek permission from the operations team, or get in touch with a member of a students’ association.
Maria Millar, a Student Health Counsellor at Massey Albany says, “From my own point of view as a counsellor and pet owner, pets have the capacity to be incredibly therapeutic, calming and reassuring due to the fact that they are generally non-judgmental. I’d love it if we could bring pets in.”
Humans aren’t the only beneficiaries of therapy dogs. “The dogs love doing what they do, and when anybody loves doing what they do, they do it well. The dogs wear a red scarf that says Canine Friends, and as soon as you bring it out, they know exactly where they’re going and what they’re doing and they are just so excited,” says Ann Evans
“They also understand us. They’ll give an extra cuddle to a student who’s a bit tearful, or be extra careful around those who have never been close to a dog. All our dogs must pass an assessment to do this, which is all based on temperament and behavior. They’re all our own pets and it is all voluntary.”
“In a student situation, we always go as a group and it seems to improve everything and make students just want to get up and do things. We just think of dogs as our happiness pill.”