Does your dog seem nervous? Then you might want to look in the mirror!

You, or maybe just your personality or lifestyle, could be making your dog stressed, nervous or anxious. In fact, new research shows that a dog's stress level mirrors that of its owner.

Dogs, like people, suffer from the adverse effects of stress. These effects depend greatly on the duration of the situation that generated them. Some stressors may be severe but short-lived (an accident, for example), while others may be less severe but last longer (financial problems, among others). It is the long-term stressors that can cause a variety of mental and physical problems.

People who are constantly stressed are more likely to have cardiovascular problems or problems with their immune system, which makes them more likely to suffer from depression or other psychological disorders. And this applies to our canine companions as well. In fact, the same pharmacological agents are used to treat stress problems in humans as they are in dogs. In order to counteract the effects of constant stress and depression in the latter, veterinarians often prescribe a canine equivalent of Prozac – beef flavored, of course!

Dogs are nonverbal, so they can’t tell us when they’re feeling anxious or tense. Instead, we have to look for signs in their body language, such as posture, tail wagging, crouching, hunching, or lethargy. While some of these signs can answer the question, “Is this dog stressed?” they can’t provide an indication of how stressed the dog is. Recent studies have shown that dogs under stress secrete the same hormones that humans do. The main marker is the amount of cortisol released into the bloodstream by the adrenal glands, a crucial part of the body that responds to different kinds of stressors. So, an increase in cortisol levels can indicate a marked increase in stress, such as from a frightening event. Cortisol concentration is therefore, for researchers, an important tool that could define in real time the extent of stress felt by the dog, and this, by a simple blood test, or more recently by simply taking a saliva sample - which is much preferable given that swabbing a dog's mouth is much less stressful for him than an injection.

The researchers knew that if they found a connection between human and dog stress levels, the next question would be, "Why does this relationship exist?" Dog owners completed several questionnaires in a study to provide information about their dog's personality, habits, and typical lifestyle. The most important finding was that there was indeed a correlation between the dog's stress level and that of its owner. (For example, dogs with relatively low stress levels tended to have relatively stress-free owners.)

To determine the reasons for this correlation, the scientists took measurements of the dog's personality, the human's personality, and their lifestyle. Statistically, the analyses clearly show that the dog's personality does not influence the human's stress. However, the human's personality seemed to be important. The researchers based their analysis on what is called the "Big Five dimensions of personality." You may find it easier to use the acronym OCEAN to define the five major dimensions: openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. In the study that was conducted here, it was the dimensions of conscientiousness and openness that caused the increase in stress, while the level of neuroticism caused a decrease in stress.

Openness is associated with imagination, the willingness to explore new things, and the appeal of new experiences. People with low openness tend to dislike change and often feel more comfortable in a familiar environment doing the usual things. Since dogs generally enjoy routine and like to predict situations, this explains why they are more stressed when their owner is at a higher level of stress than they are.

People with high conscientiousness are very organized and detail-oriented. They hate messy things and are bothered by unfinished or crooked tasks. Dogs do not worry about these kinds of details and can be messy. They also often procrastinate and are slow to complete tasks. Therefore, if the dog has an owner with a high conscientiousness dimension, he may develop a higher level of stress.

The big surprise comes from people with a high level of neuroticism who had a dog with a low level of stress. Individuals with a high rate of this dimension are susceptible to depression and sadness. One would tend to believe that this would increase the dog's stress, but no. Quite the opposite, and this would be explained by the fact that people with a high level of neuroticism would be more inclined to develop a very strong bond with their dog and that they would use it as a social and moral support, which would help to greatly reduce the stress of the animal and its master.

In short, if your dog seems stressed, anxious or nervous, it may be because you are!