Animal Assisted Activities are what you think of as “visiting pets” – the Meet and Greet. The same activity can be repeated over and over with many people. Aside from signing in and out, no records are kept and the visits are not supervised or directed.
An example of this is a team visiting clients in a skilled nursing facility or hospital and moving from room to room, person to person, bringing the animals in to be touched, enjoyed and loved on.
Animal Assisted Therapy is a goal-directed intervention directed and/or delivered by a health/human services professional with specialized expertise. AAT is designed to promote improvement in human physical, social, emotional or cognitive functioning.
An example of this is a Motivational Reading Program whereby the students’ reading scores are base lined, the books chosen for their intrinsic value and ability to hold the students’ attention, the teacher leads and guides the session, the volunteer teams are taught how to engage, motivate and initiate discussion and the students’ progress is documented.
To sum up, here is a look at the critical differences:
AAA:
- Casual Meet & Greet activities that involve pets visiting people
- No specific treatment goals planned or outcome expected
- Same activity can be used with many people
- Detailed notes unnecessary
- Visit can be spontaneous
- Visit can be as long or short as desired
- Visit is unsupervised
- Any volunteer team can participate
AAT:
- Significant part of treatment for people who are physically, emotionally, socially or cognitively challenge
- Stated goals for each session Individual treatment is created for one person or a group
- Notes on patient progress recorded at each session
- Visit is scheduled, usually at set intervals
- Length of visit is pre-determined
- Health professional is always present
- Specific teams are chosen and handlers/animals given additional training to work with said population and tasks
And sometimes there is a combined modality whereby you are integrating the animals into play therapy, recreational, art therapy or others, and the session is supervised, guided and documented by a professional and part of an overall care plan.
You may find these articles of interest:
The girl who never spoke, said Coco
One dog, one child: integrating animal assisted therapy into an overall care plan
The-human-is-as-important-as-the-pet-in-a-successful-animal-assisted-therapy-team
What the child who could not see saw in Coco
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