I don't think sniffing is like my dog's social media

Do you feel fulfilled after scrolling social media?

Do you feel fulfilled scrolling social media? I almost never do. But my dog feels fulfilled following a scent trail.

The “sniffing is like doggy social media” analogy comes with good intentions. To a degree it helps explain the impulse our dogs feel to sniff—maybe not unlike the one we feel to pick up our phones, searching for novelty—and I’m here for anything that inspires greater empathy toward the non-human creatures in our care!

But it quickly falls apart. I don’t need social media time. Most days I’m healthier without it. Scout, on the other hand, requires opportunities to use her nose. (Even better if she can move her body freely and take in the surrounding environment.)

Earlier this year I read Digital Minimalism and Deep Work by Cal Newport. They’re “one idea” books, Sean would call them—relatively simple concepts that probably don’t need hundreds of explanation pages—but sometimes it’s helpful to hear things repeated until I internalize them. (My primary issue with the author was a productivity bro vibe, but I appreciated his 2021 New Yorker piece addressing exactly that.)

Long story short: Newport identified concerns I was already feeling about social media. I’ve since spent much of the last year reflecting in circles about my own relationship with the internet—and I see the “sniffing on walks is dog Facebook” analogy in a poorer light.

Scrolling through social media is not a biologically fulfilling, natural behavior for me the way using her nose is for Scout. Sniffing can lower dogs’ heart rates and blood pressure. Social media is more likely to raise our own. Nosework can make dogs more optimistic. Social media might contribute to anxiety and depression.

Humans are visual; dogs are olfactory. When I stop on a walk to take in my surroundings more fully—to notice the first yellow leaves on Utah’s aspen trees, to evaluate whether the shape in the distance is an approaching person or just an odd rock—I am doing my own version of what Scout does with her nose to the ground. Sniffing brings her into the present moment. Scrolling social media takes me out of it.

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I don’t begrudge anyone the analogy that works for them. As I reread this, I am already accusing myself of being too nitpicky. Just let it go. But the perspective shift’s been helpful for me. If sniffing is Scout’s social media… I’m inclined to want her to do less of it, actually. But if sniffing is her vision, her first line of engagement with the world we share, a primary source of fulfillment… have at it, cattle dog.

Perhaps sniffing is more like our society’s original use of social media, back when we earnestly employed it to connect with people we couldn’t see in person. Or more like reading a newspaper or local bulletin board. It certainly isn’t Tik Tok dances and comment section arguments and algorithm complaints.