By: Jaxie Pidgeon
Students around the nation are designating man’s best friend as emotional support animals to help alleviate their suffering from various mental health disorders.
In the United States alone, 1 in 5 young adults experiences a mental health condition during their college years, according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness.
“The stress of college may impact mental health, making it difficult to manage the daily demands of school,” the alliance said.
Lauren Rubenstein, University of Texas at Austin human dimensions of organizations senior, said her freshman year was challenging without the presence of a dog. She said she suffers from anxiety and panic attack disorder.
“My whole life I grew up with at least four dogs so when I came to college, it was awful not having a dog, and I was really sick on top of that, so it was a really hard transition for me,” Rubenstein said. “I also have a long history of anxiety, so through working with my doctor, and going through the process of getting and raising a dog, it was very apparent to me that my dog fit the description of what an emotional support dog and animal should be.”
There is a difference between an emotional support animal and a service animal. Both types of animals assist people with disabilities, but there are differences in the specific functions that they perform.
“Service dogs are trained intensively by professionals for many months to perform specific tasks for people with disabilities,” said Dr. James Baker, associate chair of clinical integration and services in the Department of Psychiatry at Dell Medical School. “By contrast, an emotional support dog is not trained to do any specific tasks related to a disability but rather provides a therapeutic benefit to its owner through companionship.”
For some students, these animals provide an opportunity to help them cope.
“We have certainly seen an increase in the number of emotional support animals on campus,” said Jennifer Maedgen, senior associate vice president and the Americans with Disabilities Act coordinator at UT. “I think more and more people are realizing that it is something that they may be able to do.”
The University of Texas has a policy that outlines the rules that come with bringing an animal on university property.
“Emotional support animals are allowed into university housing if the student who is bringing the animal goes through the process, which is essentially providing documentation” to Services for Students with Disabilities, Maedgen said. “The emotional support animals are only allowed in university housing, whereas service animals are allowed in any university building including housing.”
Baker said that the lack of specific training requirements for emotional support dogs is problematic.
“Hopefully the patient’s dog is friendly, calm and without unexpected behaviors, especially in public,” Baker said. “Due to the lack of training, an emotional support dog may bark, act aggressively if it feels threatened or be intrusive of others in public.”
Emily Shryock, director of Services for Students with Disabilities at UT, said that there is no way to tell how many students at the university have a disability.
“The only way that we have numbers is the students that are registered with our office,” Shryock said. “At the end of the spring 2019 semester, we had a little over 3,000 students.”
Ryan Colvin, assistant director for occupancy management for housing and dining at UT, said that the process for registering your animal on campus is very supportive and efficient. He said there are currently eight emotional support animals registered with university housing.
“The Services for Students with Disabilities office is the initial checkpoint for going over any required documentations to be approved to have an emotional support animal,” Colvin said. “Once they have been verified and approved, they can then email the notification to the housing office, and then we will work with the student to fill out two forms on our end. I think that we have an efficient process that has the collaboration of the Services for Students with Disabilities office and the housing office.”
With the help of her 2-year-old dog, Cooper, Rubenstein said she is able to better cope with her disabilities.
“He is my emotional support animal, although people think we are each other’s emotional support team,” Rubenstein said. “Having him be there when I open the door, and seeing that he is so excited to see me makes all of my worries fade away.”
Rubenstein said that not all dogs are viable to double as emotional support animals. She said one of her friends adopted a dog from the pound to be an emotional support animal, but within two months of him owning the dog, it had attacked 12 other dogs.
“You have to make sure that you have a connection with the animal as well as make sure that your animal is kind to others,” Rubenstein said. “The whole point of an emotional support animal is to spread the love and comfort, and to say you have an emotional support animal is for it to be an emotional support animal to whoever needs it.”
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