What is body doubling (and can a dog count)?

By G, founder of Memenmo Studios · 6 October 2026

Body doubling is doing a task with someone else present, in the room, on a call or on video, who isn't there to help with it. Many neurodivergent people say it helps them start and keep going. The research so far is mostly surveys. A dog can be good company, but it isn't a treatment.

What is body doubling?

It’s doing a task with another person present, who isn’t there to do it with you. They’re just there. Writing in ADDitude, Dr Patricia Quinn describes a body double as “someone who sits with a person with ADHD as he tackles tasks that might be difficult to complete alone.”

The name is borrowed from film, where a body double stands in for an actor. Here the double doesn’t stand in for anyone. They might read, answer their own email or listen to music.

The first academic study of the term, a 2024 survey in ACM Transactions on Accessible Computing, draws a useful line. Unlike co-working, the people involved “do not need to be involved in the same task activity, nor do participants need to be engaged with each other at all.”

What kinds of body doubling are there?

Three broad kinds: in person, live online, and recorded. The 2024 survey of 220 people, most of them neurodivergent, found all three in use.

In person. A friend at the kitchen table, family in the next chair, a café or library full of strangers. Home was the most common place.
Live, online. A video or voice call with a friend, often in silence, or a co-working site that pairs you with a stranger.
Recorded. “Study with me” videos, livestreams, even podcasts.

Most people doubled with people they knew. Sixty per cent mentioned friends, 40% family and 37% co-workers, while a smaller group worked alongside strangers online or in public.

The authors map it on two scales: how close in time and place the other person is, and how aware they are of their role, from someone actively keeping you accountable to someone who’s simply there.

Why do people say body doubling helps?

Mostly for company, accountability and getting started. In the survey, help with starting a task was the second most common reason people gave.

Some said it made them feel less alone. One participant wrote that it “helps me feel less alone in my tasks. It makes everything less daunting to face.” Others described the other person as a quiet reminder of what they were meant to be doing.

Many had done it for years without a name for it, which is where the paper’s title comes from: “It was something I naturally found worked and heard about later.” Before the survey explained the term, 57% had heard of it. Once it was explained, 75% said they used it.

Is there evidence that body doubling works?

Not much yet, and the researchers are upfront about it. The 2024 paper is a survey of how and why people body double, not a trial of whether it works.

Its own limitations section notes a sample that was relatively small, mostly from the US and Europe, mostly female-identifying and weighted towards ADHD. The authors also write that “not every ND person will benefit from or enjoy body doubling.” Some participants found it more distracting than helpful, and the pressure of working with a stranger online can be stressful.

So it’s a widely reported strategy with little formal testing. It costs almost nothing to try, which is a decent reason to, and there’s no reason to feel you’re doing it wrong if it doesn’t suit you.

Can a dog count as a body double?

As company, maybe. As a treatment, no.

The survey paper notes that the other presence “does not necessarily need to be a real person to work”, and that many people use videos with real or animated characters as companionship. The research we found doesn’t look at dogs. A real dog in the room sits at the quiet end of the authors’ scale: present, unaware of your to-do list, and unable to ask how the essay’s going. For some people, that’s exactly the right amount of pressure.

Doggydoro puts a dog on screen for the same reason. It settles into a chair in a small room while you work, and each breed has its own habits: a Greyhound is asleep by minute two, and a German Shepherd stays on watch for six minutes before giving in. It won’t check on you. If its company helps the room feel less empty, good. That’s a feeling, not a fix.

How do you try body doubling?

Start small and pick the lightest version you can bear. A simple first go:

Choose one task, and say it out loud or write it down.
Pick your double: a friend on a silent call, a seat at the library, a “study with me” video, or the dog on the rug.
Set a timer for a short round, so you both know when it ends. Short Pomodoro rounds work well, and the free visual timer shows the time running down.
Afterwards, ask the questions the researchers suggest: “Not did they do the thing well, but did they start it? Did they feel better about it? Was it easier?”

Is body doubling a treatment for ADHD?

No. It’s a strategy people have worked out for themselves, shared mostly online and only lately studied, and this page doesn’t offer medical advice. At best it’s one tool among several, used alongside proper care. If you suspect ADHD, or it’s getting in the way of everyday life, healthdirect says the first step is to see a doctor. Your GP or another qualified clinician can talk through assessment and support. There’s more on other non-medical tools in focus tools for ADHD brains.