Dog owners who moan about a hard day at the office could be making their pets depressed
Dog owners who get home and start moaning about a hard day at work could be making their pets depressed, a study has found.
It revealed that dogs showed more signs of stress-related behaviour when they are exposed to owners' workplace woes.
US scientists who carried out the research insisted dog owners should avoid bringing home their problems in order to 'protect the well-being of man's best friend'.
Work-related stress affects an estimated 700,000 people a year in the UK, with an estimated 16 million working days lost each year as a result. The study, by a team of psychologists from Radford University in Virginia, set out to establish if family dogs are also affected.
They recruited 85 adults who had a dog and asked them to monitor their pets' behaviour on days when they came home stressed, as compared to days off or less-stressful shifts. Owners were told to look for signs that their dogs were unhappy, which include excessive whimpering and poor appetite.
The results, published in the journal Scientific Reports, showed that dogs displayed clear signs of stress on the days when owners moaned about problems at work. They also found that just thinking about stressful issues could drag down dogs' moods.
The researchers said: 'Dogs are highly sensitive animals who can 'catch' the emotions and feelings of humans.
'They experience increases in stress when their owner does. 'Given most people view their pets as family, protecting them against stress may encourage them to resist engaging in ruminative thoughts about work.'
Previous studies found that dogs are highly sensitive to changes in their owner's feelings, becoming distressed, for example, when they hear them crying.
The researchers added that a dog's advanced sense of smell may mean they can detect a rise in levels of cortisol – a hormone released by the adrenal glands when the body is stressed.
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