The demise of the term ‘Separation Anxiety’ has been slow, as has the uptake of the range of more accurate terms now used to describe ‘owner absent behaviours in dogs’. The most widely used term is currently ‘Separation related problem behaviours’ and this presentation aims to identify a range of emotional motivations and initiating factors that can result in dogs failing to cope during owner absence and considers why such a lack of canine coping can result in canine behaviours that owners find difficult to cope with.