Running head: PHYSICAL AND EMOTIONAL SERVICE DOGS

Community Problem Report: Service Dogs

The University of Texas at El Paso
RWS 1301
November 6th, 2016
Danielle Gonzalez

PHYSICAL
AND-EMOTIONAL
SERVICE
DOGS
SERVICE DOGS
TROUBLES AND
SOLUTIONS

Abstract

Service dogs are not all that common, yet they are not rare to see either. Throughout more
and more injuries, people are finding aid in service dogs. People with both mental and physical
disabilities use service dogs to help them in things they cannot personally do. According to the
Department of Justice, service dogs are trained to do tasks for people who have disabilities.
These service dogs have specific tasks they need to complete in order to ensure the health and
safety of the person they are assigned to. There are many reasons a person could have service
dog. Anyone with a certain type of disability is a good candidate for a service animal. How do
these animals help people? How do these animals get certified? Why should service dogs be
taken as real form of help? Not everyone takes these very important dogs seriously. Kids see
them as friendly pets, people in the military see them as an excuse to get out of working, and
some people that would qualify to use a service dog do not believe a service dog would help
them. Service dogs go through different courses to learn how to perform the tasks they will need
to do once assigned to a person. They help people physically by performing tasks, and help
emotionally by being a source of comfort and support. However, people who have service dogs
do not necessarily have an easier time than someone who has the same disability and does not
have a service dog themselves. In this paper I will explore different point of views to find out if
service dogs really are helpful?

PHYSICAL AND EMOTIONAL SERVICE DOGS

Main Body

Assistive technology is any object used to elevate, preserve, or enhance aid that disabled
people do not have without the technology. (Technology-Related Assistance for Individuals With
Disabilities Act, 1988) However, up to 75% of assistive devices stop being used.
Service dogs are a tool to helping some people with both mental and physical disabilities.
Many people see these dogs as more of a companion rather than an important mechanism to help
people live their day to day lives without unnecessary trouble. Some service dogs provide new
opportunities for someone they could not do without them. An example of this is shown in a
study where service dogs aided people in various tasks. A 39 year old man who had a spinal
injury and was in a wheelchair went to the beach with his service dog and she pulled him around
the beach. Jason, when talking about his service dog Sydneys impact on his life, said 80% of
my recreation goes away. (Camp, 2008) Without his dog, he will have drastically less activity
going on in his life. Service dogs provide a person with independence and can help with social
aspects of life for a disabled person. Service dog training is specific. The dogs are trained to do
all and only the acts that the person they are with cannot do themselves. Each training course a
service dog has taken varies from dog to dog. A person may need help doing laundry, whereas
someone else might need assistance calling 911 or alerting people nearby of an emergency.
According to the definition of assistive technology, a service dog could technically be considered
assistive technology. This is because the dogs need to maintain, or improve the lives of the
disabled people they are partnered with. (Camp, 2008)
However, not every dog is qualified or certified to be a service dog. (Charnas, 2016) On
occasion, people commit fraud by saying their dog is a service animal dog when they arent,

PHYSICAL AND EMOTIONAL SERVICE DOGS

those dogs do not deserve the rights and benefits given to real service animals. By law, a service
dog is not required to wear anything special that indicates that they are in fact a service dog.
Public areas cannot require a person to provide proof of a disability or a service dogs training. It
is the tasks that a dog must do on cue that exempts a service dog and his owner from the No
Pets Allowed rules of the public. These dogs not only have to carry out the tasks they need to
perform for their owners, but also need to have accomplished getting housebroken, have basic
obedience training, not being disruptive or aggressive, or getting into things they should not be
in. (Froling, 2009) There are many rules and regulations to follow when dealing with a service
dog. Even the people just around a service animal have rules when around a service dog. More
often than not, these people do not know about these rules. You should not pet, talk to, say their
name, make eye contact, or attempt to get the dogs attention. (Childers, 2016) Guide dogs need
to be focused because they are there to see for the person they are working for. However,
because emotional support dogs do not perform specific tasks for their partners, they are not
exempt from this rule. A dog needs to be able to perform specific tasks, and emotional support
dogs do not.
Mobility dogs are there to help the person they are partnered with to more around
and stay balanced and stable while they do. Mobility dogs are not only there to help a person
walk, but they are on occasion paired with a person who is in a wheelchair. These dogs will pick
up any items dropped by the person, as well as pull them around to wherever they may want or
need to go. Hearing ear dogs are used to help the deaf or hard of hearing. They detect sounds
their handler cannot hear themselves. Medical alert dogs are used to warn their handler of an
oncoming attack. Whether it be a seizure to an epilepsy, these dogs help the person by helping
them get ready. The person will go to a safe place or take their medication because of the dogs

PHYSICAL AND EMOTIONAL SERVICE DOGS

warning. Parkinsons helper dogs will help people with Parkinsons disease. While the person
with Parkinsons is having tremors, their feet will freeze up while the rest of their body moves.
This can cause falls. The Parkinsons helper dogs will push up against their persons foot,
breaking the freeze and allowing their person to steady themselves. (Drs. Foster & Smith,
2016) Psychiatric service dogs help a person by waking them from nightmares, remove them
from situations that can cause their person to have a panic attack, and get them their medicine or
other people for further help. (Childers, 2014) Emotional support animals help by keeping
consistent focus of their handler. Emotional support dogs can be trained to lick a persons face to
bring their partner to full awareness or distract them from a stressful situation. Emotional support
dogs will tap their person with their snout in order to grab the attention of their person in order to
stop them from being overwhelmed. There is a certain training a dog can go through to do this
same act to an autistic child that acts in repetitive behavior. If the service dog is persistent in their
nudges, it can stop a child from yelling, hitting, and other inappropriate behaviors. These dogs
also help a crying person or stop them from remembering a painful/harmful situation. (Froling,
2009) Those people who have panic attacks have also claimed having pressure from a dog sitting
on their lap can shorten their panic attack and sometimes even feel calming. People who may
fear an intruder in their home use their service dog to verify that there is no one else in the area.
The dog checking provides peace of mind to the worrisome person.
Not everyone feels that service dogs are helpful. Many people that return from war are
changed and dealing with some sort of trauma, whether it be physical or emotional. According to
a Huffington Post article, none of these people have service or emotional-support dogs. These
people go through their drama silently, sometimes even gracefully. Some receive a form of
therapy, but more often then not, a person goes through their trauma alone. When the author,

PHYSICAL AND EMOTIONAL SERVICE DOGS

Charnas, wrote

about them she realized that in 2007, service or emotional-support dogs were rarely seen but now
theyre everywhere on the seventy-five-acre base that she works at. She, as well as many others,
did not believe the dogs could actually provide help to those in need. There are still many people
who do not believe that these dogs are actually helpful.
There are many animals that provide help, yet there are also many fake service animals as
well. It is possible certified service dogs are more troublesome to take care of than they are
helpful to their person. It is also possible that not all service dogs provide adequate aid to the
person they are partnered with. There are laws in place to protect a service dog and their owner,
but there is no foolproof, legal way to verify a dog is truly a service dog. If a service dog were to
be required to wear a certain badge that cannot be counterfeited. This would allow for businesses
to verify a service dog is not a fake service dog without breaking the law. More research needs to
be conducted to make sure that emotional service dogs are truly helping their person and it is not
the mere presence of a dog that is soothing to them. This will verify that an emotional support
service dog really does provide adequate help to their handler. Lastly, there needs to be a certain
standard to ensure a service dog is providing more help than trouble to a person they are helping.

Resources:
Camp, M. M. (2000, October 18). The use of service dogs as an adaptive strategy: A qualitative
study [Electronic version]. American Journal of Occupational Therapy, 55(509),
1-9. doi:
10.5014
Childers, A. (2016, August). Why you can't pet service dogs. In anything pawsable. Retrieved
from http://www.anythingpawsable.com/cant-pet-service-dogs/#.WA1VcaOZMcg

7
Charnas, J. (2016, January 12). An education in service dogs. In THE HUFFINGTON POST.
Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/joanna-charnas/an-education-inserviced_b_8959510.html
Davis, M., & Bunnell, M. (2007). Working like dogs the service dog guidebook (pp. 1-113).
Crawford, CO: Alpine Publications.
Foster, ., & Smith, . (2016, January 12). Dog Articles, 1. Retrieved from http://
www.peteducation.com/article.cfm?c=2+2100&aid=626
Froling, J. (2009, July 30). Service dog tasks for psychiatric disabilities [Editorial] [Electronic
version]. Tasks to mitigate certain disabling illnesses classified as mental
impairments
under the Americans with disabilities act, 1.
Commonly asked questions about service animals in places of business. (2008, January 14). In
U.S. department of justice . Retrieved from
https://www.ada.gov/archive/qasrvc.htm
Service animals. (2011, July 12). In U.S. department of justice . Retrieved from https://
www.ada.gov/service_animals_2010.htm