Abstract
This study explored the effects of reading to a dog versus a human had on adult participants’ reading fluency and confidence. Ten adults, aged 18–26, participated by reading aloud to both a therapy dog and a human. Participants were randomly assigned which setting they would read to first, dog or human. Recordings were collected of each participant reading in both settings and their instances of dysfluency (e.g., fillers, repetitions) were calculated by the researchers. Participants self-reported confidence levels were gathered through pre- and post-reading surveys. While there was no statistically significant difference in dysfluency rates between the two settings (t = -1.772, p = .110), a positive trend suggested more dysfluencies occurred when reading to a human. It was found that participants reported significantly higher confidence levels when reading to a dog (t = 3.354, p = .008). These findings support the hypothesis that reading to a dog increases a person's perceived reading confidence, though not fluency, within this sample. Limitations such as small sample size and the use of convenience sampling should be noted. Future research with larger sample size is recommended to better represent the population.