Do dogs enjoy listening to music?

Who else loves watching videos of dogs howling to music?

Many studies have been conducted highlighting the positive effects music has on our brain & body: classical music can help lower our heart rate and improve our focus while jazz has been shown to increase the growth rate of plants.

Can the same phenomena be observed in pets? 

Can dogs hear music?

It is not fully understood if dogs can hear music, but they can certainly hear sound frequencies (except for some very low ones).

 In fact, dogs have a much broader audible range than us humans. That would be because their ears have 18 muscles compared to our 6!

Signs that your dog is listening or reacting to music are: being alert, ears up, stopping what they’re doing, barking, howling and appearing less anxious.

What is the effect of music on dogs?

The university of Glasgow conducted a study on the effect of music on kennelled dogs.

They determined that auditory enrichment caused positive behavioural and physiological changes in the dogs. Different genres, particularly classical, soft Rock and reggae were associated with more relaxed behaviours.

Classical music has also been found to help reduce nervous behaviour and separation anxiety in dogs.

So next time you leave your pet at home, turn the radio on or put on a soothing playlist- there are plenty of dog’s playlists on Spotify and YouTube.

What genre of music do dogs prefer?

More studies examined dogs reacting to various genres to discover what sort of music they prefer. In these studies, dogs were introduced to heavy metal, modern pop, and classical music, with their reactions being recorded.

Pop music did not seem to provoke any kind of response because the sound frequency is like those in human conversation. Our dogs tend to tune out to our daily rambling!

The heavy metal music fostered a negative response including barking and general agitation.

Classical music, and reggae on the other end, seemed to help calm the animals, reducing the level of stress they were experiencing.

Why do dogs howl to music?

Howling is deeply buried in your dog’s genetic code. In fact, your dog might not know they’re howling! However, not all dogs will be frequent howlers.

If you’re playing an instrument or listening to music and your dog starts howling, it’s because they’re trying to participate in this “communication” exercise.

Dogs also pick up higher frequencies than the human ear, so they may be howling along to something you can’t even hear.

Not all dogs will howl in reaction to music, but if you have a crooner at home, don’t forget to record it for posterity!

Does your dog react to music?

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