蜜芽传媒

Iris Sch枚berl, a behavioural biologist at the University of Vienna, spoke to 5live after she co-led a study into the relationships between dogs and their owners. Iris described to 5live what the research entailed:

鈥淲e tested 132 owners and their dogs within three meetings doing different challenging situations. So, for example, the dog being alone for a couple of minutes, then the owner had to lead the dog through a wire mesh bridge, and then we also asked the owner to play with the dog like they would normally do during daily life, and during one meeting we also had two threat situations, one where the owner was present and one were the owner was absent.鈥�

The study found a correlation between owner personalities and the dog鈥檚 ability to cope with stress. She continued:

鈥淥wners who have an optimistic and open personality, they have dogs that have better stress coping than, say, a pessimistic owner.鈥�

This clip was taken from 蜜芽传媒 5live Breakfast on Sunday 12th February.