For the Love of a Dog: Understanding Emotion in You and Your Best Friend
by Patricia McConnell
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Book Summary Information
Author: Patricia McConnellEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2007-08-28
ISBN: 0345477154
Number of pages: 368
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Book Reviews of For the Love of a Dog: Understanding Emotion in You and Your Best Friend
Book Review: An Unusually Eloquent, Sensitive and Extremely Insightful Book
Summary: 5 Stars
Patricia McConnell is not only exceptionally bright and knowledgeable, she is the best writer in her field. And what a writer! This book is very insightful, appropriately compassionate, empathetic and richly emotive. Although there can be no one, all encompassing way of understanding all dogs and their spectrum of behavior that is clear, coherent and comprehensive--without accounting for omissions and contradictions--this book comes close--from one perspective. After all, it does address understanding the emotions experienced by our companion animals and appropriately interpreting their behavior that we see as a consequence. Dr. McConnell is very persuasive and she extended what can be known and experienced in my personal understanding and interactions with dogs.
This book relies upon Dr. McConnell's professional training, teaching, as well as her years of practical observation and experience living in intimate relationships with several dogs on her Wisconsin farm. Her empathy and compassion are extraordinary just as her ability to share them with the reader makes this an unusually engaging book for the mind and heart. Her knowledge is impressive because she is not merely responding or reacting to what she observes. But she does live it and it is that level that we can initially understand and share prior to gaining deeper insights and knowledge about behavior that we can apply. Although it is personal and anecdotal you are really getting a range of useful clues and wisdom. To clarify the meaning of dog behavior helps you, in turn, act, in order to have a healthier, happier pet that is easier and more joyful to live with. For example, in what variety of ways does dog behavior and expression convey nervousness, fear, stress or unease? How can you clearly respond that successfully communicates calming reassurances? How we act and interact has consequences.
Regardless, use whatever ideas work best for you and for your specific breed of dogs, their temperament and each more specifically, one's specific, individual personality. Perhaps it includes a critically specific history in the case of a rescued dog. This author's assumption is that you love and feel responsible for the dog's well being. This book is not really a training book but a book about explication, perception and the importance of recognizing emotions we send as messages with or without our cognizance and those sent by our best friends, unfortunately, are often ignored or misinterpreted. We all search for solutions and knowledge that works and provide answers. But for something deeper, perhaps at times more ethereal, possibly more intuitive at times, but always well informed by a lively intelligence and impressively encompassing life experience, I found this delightfully well written book especially insightful and I believe, exactly on target. You too could begin to observe your dog much more closely from now on. Questions will abound and possibilities will mount. Nonverbal communication will have new meaning. You might find yourself speaking what appears to be for the most part, a universal Canine language, most often in a paralinguistic manner that seems to work. Ultimately that is what really matters.
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Summary of For the Love of a Dog: Understanding Emotion in You and Your Best Friend
Yes, humans and canines are different species, but current research provides fascinating, irrefutable evidence that what we share with our dogs is greater than how we vary. As behaviorist and zoologist Dr. Patricia McConnell tells us in this remarkable new book about emotions in dogs and in people, more and more scientists accept the premise that dogs have rich emotional lives, exhibiting a wide range of feelings including fear, anger, surprise, sadness, and love.In For the Love of a Dog, McConnell suggests that one of the reasons we love dogs so much is that they express emotions in ways similar to humans. After all, who can communicate joy better than a puppy? But not all emotional expressions are obvious, and McConnell teaches both beginning dog owners and experienced dog lovers how to read the more subtle expressions hidden behind fuzzy faces and floppy ears.
For those of us who deeply cherish our dogs but are sometimes baffled by their behavior, For the Love of a Dog will come as a revelation-a treasure trove of useful facts, informed speculation, and intriguing accounts of man's best friend at his worst and at his very best. Readers will discover how fear, anger, and happiness underlie the lives of both people and dogs and, most important, how understanding emotion in both species can improve the relationship between them. Thus McConnell introduces us to the possibility of a richer, more rewarding relationship with our dogs.
While we may never be absolutely certain what our dogs are feeling, with the help of this riveting book we can understand more than we ever thought possible. Those who consider their dogs part of the family will find For the Love of a Dog engaging, enlightening, and utterly engrossing.
From the Hardcover edition.
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