The Reduction of Stress in College Students Through Interactions with Pets

The Reduction of Stress in College Students Through Interactions with Pets

Presenter(s)

Hanna Dwyer Stier

Description

This study focused on reduction of stress through different interactions between students and pets. Participants consisted of 31 females and 3 males from an Introduction to Psychology course. The amount of time participants interacted with the pet (5, 10, or 15 minutes) through activities such as feeding, talking, and playing served as predictors of stress reduction as measured with SVAS. The SVAS has participants indicate their current stress level before and after interacting with the pet by adjusting a marker between 0 (Not stressed at all) and 100 (The most stress imaginable). Post-intervention stress was subtracted from pre-intervention stress as an indicator of stress reduction. The results do not support the prediction that interacting with the pet through feeding reduces stress than interacting with the pet through talking which should reduce stress less than interacting with the pet through playing. Low statistical power due to a low sample size occurred as a limitation, leaving only a one in four chance for finding statistically significant results. For future research, the study can be conducted with a larger sample size. Keywords: interaction, stress

Publication Date

4-22-2021

Project Designation

Independent Research

Primary Advisor

Greg C. Elvers

Primary Advisor's Department

Psychology

Keywords

Stander Symposium project, College of Arts and Sciences

The Reduction of Stress in College Students Through Interactions with Pets

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