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Anxiety is a major problem for many pet dogs. What happens in your dog’s brain and body when something scares her? How long can you expect her stress response to last?
In this webinar, Jessica Hekman, DVM, PhD, will talk about the stress response in dogs. She will explain the original evolutionary purpose of the stress response; what the hormones involved in it (like cortisol) do in the body; the difference between acute and chronic stress and the different effects they have on dogs’ health; and what we know about how long it takes the body to clear those hormones. You will definitely learn some cool stuff about how the brain works and what that means for your stressed-out dog!
Learning Objectives:
- Describe how the stress response functions and what its purpose is.
- Describe health effects (both positive and negative!) for acute versus chronic stress.
- Explain how the stress response affects the dog’s brain and their ability to think clearly and behave normally.
- Describe how long it takes the stress response to clear from the body, and list possible alternative explanations for dogs who display signs of stress longer than it takes for stress hormones to be cleared.
About The Presenter
Dr. Jessica Hekman, DVM, PhD
Jessica is a veterinary researcher who is fascinated by dog behavior. After eleven years working as a computer programmer, she decided to go back to school to research the causes of behavior problems in dogs. She received her veterinary degree in 2012 from the Tufts Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine in Massachusetts, where she also received a Master’s degree for her work on stress behaviors in hospitalized dogs. After graduation, she completed a year-long internship specializing in shelter medicine at the University of Florida Maddie’s Shelter Medicine Program. She received her PhD in genetics at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, studying a group of foxes (often known as the “Siberian silver foxes”) which have been bred over many generations to be friendly to humans. She is currently working at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard as a postdoctoral associate, studying the genetics of behavior in pet dogs through the Darwin’s Ark project and the Working Dogs Project. Her ultimate goal is to find genetic causes of fearfulness in dogs, to work with behaviorally challenged shelter dogs, and to help people better understand the science behind dog behavior. She also frequently teaches online classes and webinars about canine genetics and behavior. Jessica lives in Raymond, NH with her husband and three dogs. You can follow her on Twitter @dogzombieblog or on Facebook at facebook.com/dogzombieblog.
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