Humans best friend – emotional, physiological and behavioral
synchrony across species (Agria_SocialDog2)
Main funder
Funder's project number: P2023-0001
Funds granted by main funder (€)
- 46 306,61
Funding program
Project timetable
Project start date: 01/01/2024
Project end date: 31/12/2024
Summary
Today, domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) are members of human families. In 2018, approx. 470
million dogs were kept as pets in the world. 700 000 pet dogs lived in Finland alone, exceeding
the number of human inhabitants of the capital Helsinki. The Finnish Kennel Club also registers
approx. 50 000 pedigree dogs annually, which exceeds the number of human infants born in
Finland: for many young couples, dogs appear a substitute of a baby. Dogs have societal roles as
guardians, hunters, shepherds and therapy facilitators; they work with the customs, police, and army. During the COVID-19 pandemic, people have spent more time in their homes and adopted pets as companions, raising the numbers of pet dogs even higher. What are the underlying mechanisms behind this across-species friendship, and how do the dog owners’ psychological and physiological qualities affect the welfare of the dog? And finally, how could we facilitate the selection of pet dogs in a way that would be beneficial for both the human and the dog, sculpting them an emotionally functional dyad? This project will clarify the psychological modulators (temperament and individual characteristics, empathy, experience and learning) and physiological and biometric derivatives (non-invasive brain responses, heart rate variability (HRV), 3D motion with accelerometers) of both humans and dogs, within several points of behavior and human-dog interaction.
million dogs were kept as pets in the world. 700 000 pet dogs lived in Finland alone, exceeding
the number of human inhabitants of the capital Helsinki. The Finnish Kennel Club also registers
approx. 50 000 pedigree dogs annually, which exceeds the number of human infants born in
Finland: for many young couples, dogs appear a substitute of a baby. Dogs have societal roles as
guardians, hunters, shepherds and therapy facilitators; they work with the customs, police, and army. During the COVID-19 pandemic, people have spent more time in their homes and adopted pets as companions, raising the numbers of pet dogs even higher. What are the underlying mechanisms behind this across-species friendship, and how do the dog owners’ psychological and physiological qualities affect the welfare of the dog? And finally, how could we facilitate the selection of pet dogs in a way that would be beneficial for both the human and the dog, sculpting them an emotionally functional dyad? This project will clarify the psychological modulators (temperament and individual characteristics, empathy, experience and learning) and physiological and biometric derivatives (non-invasive brain responses, heart rate variability (HRV), 3D motion with accelerometers) of both humans and dogs, within several points of behavior and human-dog interaction.
Principal Investigator
Primary responsible unit
Follow-up groups
Profiling area: Behaviour change, health, and well-being across the lifespan (University of Jyväskylä JYU) BC-Well; School of Wellbeing (University of Jyväskylä JYU) JYU.Well
