Just like humans, dogs do well under stress

London: It's not just humans who perform better in tests or athletic events when slightly nervous but dogs too perform equally well under stress, says a new study. A little extra stress makes hyper dogs crack under pressure but gives mellow dogs an edge.

A little stress can be a good thing, but only up to a certain point, as the Yerkes-Dodson law spells out in psychology. The team wanted to find out if the conditions that enable certain animals to do their best also depend on the animal's underlying temperament. They challenged dogs to retrieve a meat jerky treat from a person standing behind a clear plastic barrier.

To get it right, the dogs had to resist the impulse to try to take the shortest path to reach the treat and instead walk around the barrier to one of the open sides. For the dogs that were naturally calm and laid-back measured by how quickly they tended to wag their tails increasing the level of excitement and urgency boosted their ability to stay on task and get the treat.