11/28/2025
.How Human Health Can Affect Dog Behaviour
Dogs are incredible observers. They pay attention to our tone, posture, scent, movement, breathing, and daily rhythms. When a human in the home is experiencing physical or mental health challenges, dogs can pick up on these changes.
Here’s how human health can influence canine behaviour:
1. Changes in human scent
Illness, hormonal changes, stress, or medication can alter a person’s natural scent. Dogs rely on scent as one of their primary ways of interpreting the world, so these changes can create uncertainty or concern.
2. Shifts in human routine
Health challenges often disrupt daily structure, walks may become shorter, feeding times shift, play decreases. Dogs thrive on consistency, so sudden changes can lead to anxiety, frustration, or restlessness.
3. Changes in human mood and body language
Pain, fatigue, depression, and stress all affect how we move, speak, and interact. Even subtle shifts are meaningful to dogs, who may respond with behaviours ( but not limited to)
increased clinginess
guarding behaviours
reduced confidence
agitation or pacing
withdrawal
4. Reduced engagement or communication
When a person isn’t feeling well, their ability to offer clear guidance, cues, or affection may change. Dogs can become confused or begin to test boundaries simply because they are unsure.
5. Empathic or mirroring responses
Some dogs, especially highly attuned or bonded individuals, may actually mirror the emotional state of their human.
If the person is stressed, the dog becomes stressed. If the person is sedentary, the dog’s energy and behaviour may shift too.
Our health and wellbeing matters!!
Now can you imagine a dog processing the emotional and or physical information from thier humans and then trying to " train" this out of the dog!
Training a dog using kind methods could still potentially add more stressors in some situations. My goal is always to seek ways to decrease demands and pressures not add more expectations.
Now think about someone using harsher methods to stop the behaviour, I find it very sad to think about how those dogs might feel.
Why Professionals Investigate the Whole Picture
A dog doesn’t exist in isolation. Their behaviour is shaped by:
the home environment
the relationships around them
daily routines
the emotional climate
and yes, even human health
A skilled and ethical dog professional investigates all aspects of a dog’s life because behaviour is rarely the result of one simple cause.
By understanding and identifying stressors the dog is responding to. Adapting support plans to the family’s capacity, and supporting both dog and humans more compassionately.
We can better avoid mislabeling behaviours as “problems” when they’re actually symptoms, and can encourage better lines of communication and understanding and work towards long term change..
A good professional investigates, we dont simply turn up, train and leave 🔎
