In Christchurch, where I live and practice, we’re known for our flat landscape in most parts of the city and suburbs. However, we do have some hilly suburbs which are considered prime real estate for those wanting a view and a different level of privacy.
With those hilly sections come challenges.
Homes in these areas tend to require stairs or steep drives and a walk in the neighbourhood demands hill-walking; much different to the single story traditional housing on the flats. That said, new infill developments are building upwards. Usually, these take the form of multi-unit dwellings that are two or three stories high. All have staircases, most are steep to make the most of the available space.
As a mobile practitioner, I work with dogs in a range of settings. One fact that is universal, however, is that an aging dog is more likely to slip on floors and to have difficulty walking up/down stairs and hills. A dog of any age that has an injury is also going to have the same problems.
Owners of smaller breeds can carry them; for larger breeds, this is not an option.
So, if you are relocating to a new home, please think of your dog before signing on the dotted line. Your dog will age must faster than you do. A bit of planning can help you make a good choice so your dog can enjoy your home and neighbourhood for the rest of their life.
P.S. Not every family has the capacity to build a stair lift like Eddie’s family did. (RIP, Eddie)
Kathleen Crisley is Fear-Free certified dog massage therapist and canine fitness trainer. She has a particular passion for working with dogs and their families to ensure injury prevention and quality of life. She specialises in working with anxious and emotionally damaged dogs. Her mobile practice, The Balanced Dog, is based in Christchurch, New Zealand
A new study demonstrates that some highly gifted dogs can categorize objects not just by appearance, but by how they are used. When taught words like “pull” or “fetch,” these dogs later applied the concepts to brand-new toys through natural play, without training or explicit labeling.
This shows that dogs can form mental representations of objects based on their function rather than physical features. The findings highlight the depth of canine cognition and suggest links to the evolution of human language and memory.
Key Facts
Functional Categorization: Dogs grouped toys by use (tugging vs. fetching) instead of looks.
No Training Needed: Skills emerged from natural play with owners, not formal instruction.
Language Insight: Results hint at shared cognitive roots between dogs and humans in learning words.
As infants, humans naturally learn new words and their associations—like the fact that forks are related to bowls because both are used to consume food.
In a study publishing in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on September 18, a team of animal behavior experts demonstrate that dogs can categorize objects by function, too.
In a series of playful interactions with their owners, a group of Gifted Word Learner (GWL) dogs were able to distinguish between toys used for tugging versus fetching, even when the toys in question didn’t share any obvious physical similarities—and then could remember those categorizations for long periods of time, all with no prior training.
“We discovered that these Gifted Word Learner dogs can extend labels to items that have the same function or that are used in the same way,” says author Claudia Fugazza of Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary.
It’s like a person calling both a traditional hammer and a rock by the same name, says Fugazza.
“The rock and the hammer look physically different, but they can be used for the same function,” she says. “So now it turns out that these dogs can do the same.”
The studies took place in the dogs’ natural home environments with their human owners. At the beginning, the dogs spent time getting familiar with verbal labels for two functional groups of objects: pull and fetch. Their owners used these words with specific toys and played with them accordingly even though the toys didn’t share any similar physical features.
Next, the dogs were tested to see if they had learned to connect the functional labels to the correct group of toys before playing with more novel toys in the two distinct categories. However, this time, their owners didn’t use the “pull” and “fetch” labels for the dogs.
The team found that the dogs were able to extend the functional labels they’d learned previously to the new toys based on their experience playing with them. In the final test, the dogs showed that they could successfully apply the verbal labels to the toys by either pulling or fetching accordingly, even when their owners hadn’t named them.
“For these new toys, they’ve never heard the name, but they have played either pull or fetch, and so the dog has to choose which toy was used to play which game,” Fugazza says. “This was done in a natural setup, with no extensive training. It’s just owners playing for a week with the toys. So, it’s a natural type of interaction.”
The authors note that the dogs’ ability to connect verbal labels to objects based on their functional classifications and apart from the toys’ physical attributes suggests that they form a mental representation of the objects based on their experience with their functions, which they can later recall.
These findings provide insight into the evolution of basic skills related to language and their relationship to other cognitive abilities, including memory, the researchers say.
More research is needed to understand the scope and flexibility of dogs’ language categorization abilities. The researchers suggest future studies to explore whether dogs that don’t learn object labels may nevertheless have an ability to classify objects based on their functions.
“We have shown that dogs learn object labels really fast, and they remember them for a long period, even without rehearsing,” Fugazza says. “And I think the way they extend labels also beyond perceptual similarities gives an idea of the breadth of what these labels could be for dogs.”
I’ve just read this piece by Dr Mia Cobb of the University of Melbourne and had to share it. Thankfully, it was published under a Creative Commons license to enable re-publication with citation.
But something has changed globally over the last year, and it has big implications for dogs worldwide.
This rapid cascade of bans signals something much bigger. Picture: Getty Images
But what does this mean for the other dogs in our lives? The detection dogs in our airports, the dogs assisting people with disabilities, those supporting students in our schools or even the dog asleep on your couch?
We may donate to assistance dog charities, watch border detection programs on TV and admire search-and-rescue teams helping in disaster zones without considering what daily life looks like for these canine workers.
As people become increasingly conscious about animal treatment, from farm animals to those in entertainment, this awareness is expanding to include all the ways we ‘use’ dogs.
Our expanding awareness of animal treatment now includes all the ways we ‘use’ dogs. Picture: Getty Images
The recent greyhound racing collapse demonstrates how quickly public support can evaporate when welfare concerns aren’t adequately addressed.
Consider the contrast between those who embrace scrutiny versus those that resist it.
Some organisations or operators working with dogs proactively demonstrate their welfare standards, welcome independent oversight and engage openly with concerns. Others operate behind closed doors or respond defensively when questions arise about how their animals are bred, reared, housed, trained and rehomed.
Those thriving under increased public attention share common approaches: they treat welfare as a core priority rather than a compliance exercise, even when it means making major changes to the way in which they operate (for example, their training methods or the equipment used).
They also understand that genuine transparency builds public trust in ways that defensive responses never can.
But there’s an important distinction between real change and ‘welfare washing’ surface-level improvements designed more for public relations than to genuinely assure animal wellbeing.
The public is becoming increasingly sophisticated at spotting the difference.
The speed of recent racing bans – three jurisdictions in around 18 months – shows how rapidly momentum can build once public opinion shifts.
What earning trust looks like
The organisations embracing increased welfare scrutiny share common characteristics.
They proactively demonstrate care standards rather than waiting for pressure. They welcome independent monitoring and engage genuinely with concerns rather than dismissing them.
There’s a reframing from dogs as tools we use to co-workers we partner with. Picture: Getty Images
Most importantly, they recognise that working with dogs comes with profound responsibilities.
This reframing, from dogs as tools we use to co-workers we partner with, means ensuring dogs have agency in their daily lives – the ability to make choices about when to rest, opportunities to be dogs rather than just workers and environments that offer them positive social and physical experiences.
It means transparency about career length, retirement plans, injury rates and living conditions. It means treating welfare as a core business priority, not a public relations exercise.
The dogs supporting our lives
International Dog Day provides an annual opportunity to shine a spotlight on all the dogs we rely on in our lives, not just our pets at home.
t’s a chance to ask: are we caring for these animals as well as we can?
The greyhound racing industry’s decline shows what happens when the answer is unclear or unconvincing.
Public trust, once lost, is extraordinarily difficult to rebuild, especially when alternatives exist that don’t rely on the use of real animals.
Everyone relying on dogs should be asking themselves: if public attention suddenly focused on our operation tomorrow, would we welcome that scrutiny? Can we demonstrate genuine care for our animals’ wellbeing, not just their productivity?
The dogs supporting our lives – whether working at airports, guiding people safely across roads or living as companions in our homes – deserve nothing less than our full consideration of their wellbeing.
Are we caring for these animals as well as we can? Picture: Getty Images
And as the racing industry is discovering, the public increasingly expects to see proof of that care, not just promises.
They’ll be part of building a sustainable future where our partnerships with dogs are genuinely rewarding for both species. Those who can’t may find themselves wondering how something that seemed so permanent could disappear so quickly.
The choice is theirs to make – but the window for making it may be narrower than they think.
A new study has found that having a pet dog or cat can slow down cognitive decline.
Stock image of a puppy looking at its owner. Credit : Getty
NEED TO KNOW
A new study has found that having a cat or a dog may have a “protective factor” over cognitive abilities as you age, helping to “slow down” mental decline
The study looked at 18 years of data in adults over 50 and found a “slower decline in multiple cognitive domains” for dog and cat owners
Having a fish or a bird didn’t have an impact on cognitive abilities, the study found
The type of pet you have can impact how your brain ages — and dogs and cats have a “protective factor” that can “slow down cognitive decline.”
Dog and cat owners saw improved brain health — more than those who had birds or fish, or no pets — according to a new study, published in Scientific Reports, that used 18 years of data on cognitive decline in adults over 50.
“Both cat and dog owners experienced slower decline in multiple cognitive domains — dog owners in immediate and delayed recall, cat owners in verbal fluency and delayed recall,” the study found. “Fish and bird ownership had no significant association with cognitive decline.”
“Several explanations may help explain the absence of this association in fish and bird owners, despite the reports of their ownership’ positive influence on wellbeing in ways that are usually associated with cognitive benefits,” study author Adriana Rostekova, from the University of Geneva’s lifespan developmental psychology research group said, per The Guardian.
The study theorized that the shorter lifespan of a bird or fish impacts “the level of emotional connection,” due to “frequently having to deal with the pet’s death.” The study also pointed out that birds can be incredibly loud: “Bird ownership may negatively affect the owner’s sleep quality due to the increased noise levels, which has been shown to be associated with cognitive decline.”
But the very nature of owning a cat or a dog may help the brain stay healthy, Rostekova explained: “There is also a possibility of increased social stimulation facilitated by cats and dogs, which may be linked to the slower cognitive decline experienced by their owners: an increased frequency of social interactions when accompanied by a dog – or for cats, a substitute for a social network.”
The study says that, since “dog and cat ownership might act as a protective factor aiding to slow down cognitive decline, thus contributing to healthy cognitive [aging],” these findings could help inform policies on healthy aging, specifically to make veterinary care or pet insurance “more accessible to older adults” — as well as advocate for “animal-friendly senior housing options, such as assisted living facilities or nursing homes.”
I exercise each week with the help of a nifty fitness app (Ladder—it’s great) that offers workout plans from a personal trainer and encouragement from other users. The instructors are knowledgeable and the community encouraging. But neither is my favorite thing about the app.
My favorite thing is when other users share pictures of their pets.
Photo: Getty Images
Now, seeing a border collie doing downward dog right along with their owner is, of course, super-adorable. And I am not going to lie. I am a pet lover through and through. Animal pictures make me irrationally happy.
But my giddiness at seeing someone’s golden retriever running buddy isn’t just about the universal appeal of cute animals or my over-the-top animal obsession. According to recent research, it reveals a useful truth that can help you build relationships not just at the gym, but at work too.
If you want to connect with people more deeply, the Wharton School at the University of Pennyslyvania study indicates, sharing a picture of your pet is an ideal way to do it.
Sharing personal information at work is a minefield
The study was born out of a common modern conundrum. Should you connect with colleagues on social media, and if so, what should you share?
Like the rest of us, the research team realized that social media offered both promise and peril for workers. It can help you feel closer to teammates, which just might make you happier and more successful.
“One of the things that we found in the study is that people will be much more comfortable connecting to other people who disclose personal information,” Wharton’s Nancy Rothbard, who was involved in the research, explained in one podcast interview.
But then again, seeing your boss downing a beer with his bros or joking about her colonoscopy (or your boss seeing you doing the same) blurs boundaries that make a lot of us uncomfortable.
As another Wharton professor, Adam Grant, once observed: “Authenticity without empathy is selfish. Of course we should be true to our values, but one of those values should probably be caring about others.” Your sharing shouldn’t cause others discomfort.
How are office workers navigating this charged landscape? To find out, the researchers conducted a series of in-depth interviews and also reviewed data on actual social media use.
Different people, different dangers
To no one’s surprise, the interviews confirmed that the question of social media use and how much personal information to disclose at work is fraught.
As Rothbard memorially puts it, interviewees “would equate connecting with a boss on Facebook or Instagram as equivalent to connecting with their mother. It was sort of the same horror.”
The team also found that the calculation of what kind of personal information to share was different for different types of people. Women who disclosed more personal information were generally assessed more positively, for instance. This is likely because of stereotypes that suggest women should be warm and friendly. Male bosses who shared a lot, on the other hand, were quickly seen as creepy.
To reap the benefits and avoid the potential pitfalls of social media at the office, workers employed various strategies, from being an open book to carefully curating their audience or content. (You can read more about these strategies here if you’re interested).
But whatever strategy they employed, nearly everyone was attempting to hit the same target. They wanted to come across as warm and human so they could connect on a deeper human level. But they didn’t want to embarrass themselves or anyone else by oversharing or prying.
A pet strategy for connection that works for everyone
Handily, Rothbard and her colleagues uncovered a secret weapon that anyone can use to hit that elusive sweet spot — your dog.
“Cute dog pics are a very, very hot commodity,” Rothbard correctly observes.
“If you have a cute dog and you want to post pictures of them, that’s a very good strategy, because people always love them, and they feel like they know you, and they feel connected to you. It gives them a sense of warmth that you’re displaying and a feeling that they know something about you that’s important, and that’s not fake or surface level. So, that personal disclosure really helps to create a bond between you and your fellow co-workers,” she goes on to explain.
This tallies with a large body of social science research that shows people tend to evaluate others on two basic qualities, warmth and competence. When we meet someone our first instinct is to ask: are they nice? Do they wish me harm? And, are they any good at their job? Can they do the things they say they can do?
Sharing pics of your weekend keg stand might get you tagged as warm, but it’s not going to do anything for perceptions of your competence. On the other hand, nailing every assignment but never saying a peep about your personal life is great for competence but lousy for warmth. Research suggests those that go furthest project both qualities.
You know what also allows you to project warmth without undermining your air of professional competence? Your dog doing yoga with you.
The bottom line here for everyone is a research-backed permission slip to let loose and pepper your team’s Slack channel with your cat’s wacky antics or dog’s doofy smile. You always knew your pets were super cute. Now you have data to prove they are also a secret weapon for connecting with others.
But there’s also another takeaway here for entrepreneurs and other business leaders, illustrated by my love of my fitness app’s pet picture days. If you want your team or your users to bond without crossing boundaries that make anyone uncomfortable, pets are a go-to move.
Create that dedicated chat for sharing animal pics. Show off your pooch at the beginning of the Zoom call. Organize a cutest pet pic contest among your team or your customers.
Getting people to talk about their animals is a science-backed way to help them truly connect without oversharing or awkwardness.
The opinions expressed here by Inc.com columnists are their own, not those of Inc.com.
Librela, known as Beransa in New Zealand, came onto the market in 2023 in both the USA and New Zealand (it has been introduced earlier in the UK and Europe, in 2021). In late 2023, I shared this post from Dr Darryl Millis about things to consider before choosing to use it with your dog.
Librela/Beransa is an injectable treatment for canine osteoarthritis manufactured by Zoetis.
The drug works by targeting and blocking the action of nerve growth factor, NGF, with a monoclonal antibody called bedinvetmab. NGF is a protein that plays a role in the pain and inflammation associated with osteoarthritis. By binding to NGF, bedinvetmab prevents NGF from activating its receptors on nerve cells, thus blocking the pain signal.
Based on the evaluation and analysis of the reports and signs seen for Librela, the recommendation is to add a Post Approval Experience (PAE) section to the current label:
Post Approval Experience Section (2024) The following adverse events are based on post-approval adverse drug experience reporting for LIBRELA. Not all adverse events are reported to FDA/CVM. It is not always possible to reliably estimate the adverse event frequency or establish a causal relationship to product exposure using these data.
The following adverse events in dogs are categorized in order of decreasing reporting frequency by body system and in decreasing order of reporting frequency within each body system:
Neurologic: ataxia, seizures, paresis, proprioceptive deficits, paralysis General: anorexia, lethargy, recumbency Renal/Urinary: polydipsia, polyuria/pollakiuria, urinary incontinence Gastrointestinal: vomiting, diarrhea Musculoskeletal: muscle weakness, muscle tremors, lameness In some cases, death (including euthanasia) has been reported as an outcome of the adverse events listed above.
In addition, we suggest that owners be advised of the adverse reactions that may occur following administration of Librela.
In the USA, a lawsuit has been filed alleging that Zoetis acted in a negligent manner in promoting its product.
In Australia, a class action lawsuit is being prepared by pet owners who state that their veterinarians described Beransa as a safe and effective drug without known side effects.
Why am I writing this post? To educate and to inform. I’m mindful that many of the commercials for human medications these days remind consumers “All medications have risks and benefits. Talk to your doctor to see if this product is right for you.”
There are veterinarians and dog owners who are reporting good results with this medication, particularly for those dogs who are elderly and for whom other arthritis medications have not worked. If your vet has recommended Beransa, be sure they have explained the possible risks to you and that you are happy to accept those risks on behalf of your dog.
Kathleen Crisley is Fear-Free certified dog massage therapist and canine fitness trainer. She has a particular passion for working with dogs and their families to ensure injury prevention and quality of life. She specialises in working with anxious and emotionally damaged dogs. Her mobile practice, The Balanced Dog, is based in Christchurch, New Zealand
Chances are you either have a dog, know someone with a dog, or spend too much time on the internet watching dog videos. Dogs. Are. Great. Maybe it’s from uniquely coevolving with humans, or maybe it’s because they’re so darn smart, agile, comforting, and cute—but there’s definitely a connection. Whenever we’re on the move, they’re on the move too—and excited about it. Even if it’s just to the kitchen, it is still a fun adventure together.
Any one of us living with a dog (a whopping 60 million—or 45.5%—nationally) has anecdotal evidence to back it up. But how can we measure the ways dogs impact our movement habits and thereby our health and wellness? Katie Potter, Behavioral Medicine Lab director and associate professor of kinesiology, decided to find out.
It all started with a little floppy-eared canine named Chloe. Potter, a slight, brown-haired woman with an athletic frame and a life-long affinity for dogs, adopted the short-haired pup in grad school, and they became inseparable. As someone studying kinesiology and behavioral health, Potter was more aware than most just how much her connection with Chloe improved her wellbeing. Time spent walking and playing with the sweet-tempered Chloe was also time that Potter spent being active and meeting new people in her neighborhood. On bad weather days, people without dogs can be tempted to stay inside in a cozy cocoon of home. But one look at Chloe’s innocent, black-and-white-splotched face had Potter pulling on her boots and reaching for a leash. Chloe also actively helped Potter once she started working in the Behavioral Medicine Lab at UMass, modeling new activity trackers, quality testing the lab treats, and reminding the team to stay in the moment and that, sometimes, you really just need to go for a walk. Potter was a doting pet parent but a scientist through and through.
When Chloe passed away in 2021, Potter had already been inspired by her to research the ways pet ownership might help people become healthier and more active. Motivated by the understanding of how activity levels contribute to or mitigate health conditions like heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and osteoporosis, Potter was convinced that the addition of multiple, small physical activities to a person’s life could lead to big beneficial outcomes. But now, she was even more driven to find out how specifically and find a way to engage a community around a shared love of pet care. Currently, less than 25% of adults in the United States meet the federal guidelines for physical activity. And children aren’t doing any better.
Professor Katie Potter clasps a new activity tracking collar around Percy’s neck while wearing her own for monitoring how close they are to each other.
Dog ownership was a potential avenue to inspire people to move on a grand scale and it excited her. “People are already convinced that animals are good for their health, so we’re trying to determine the evidence base for that,” Potter explains. As she better understands what the impact is from our dog-human bond, she can glean which small actions can be recreated as programs and introduced to the population at large.
Studies show that, to get people to make healthy, lasting changes to their daily routines, those changes need to be ones they actually enjoy. Luckily, a lot of people enjoy canine companionship. So, over the past five years, Potter and doctoral candidate Colleen Sands ’25 have designed observational studies to show how dog ownership affects/impacts physical activity levels, and the effects on specific health issues.
The big question
Does getting a dog make you more active? This is one of the biggest questions Potter is trying to answer. It is equally likely that physically active people get dogs because dogs fit within their already active lifestyle. But how do you test for that?
One of the most difficult parts of this type of experimentation is obtaining data on how active people are before they get a dog. “There’s currently a lack of studies that look at how getting a dog changes the owners’ activity and health—because they’re so logistically challenging,” says Potter. “You have to get data on folks before they bring the dog home and then follow them over time.”
Fortunately, a Massachusetts-based organization called Last Hope K9 Rescue agreed to work with Potter on a 12-week “BuddyStudy.” The study monitored 11 participants for six weeks as they experienced fostering a new dog. Starting out with baseline measurements—their average daily steps and their perceived stress levels or signs of depression (via questionnaires)—Potter was then able to see any noticeable changes at their mid-point check in.
It should be noted that many of the program participants actually ended up adopting their foster dogs through Last Hope K9 Rescue, making the measurements taken at the end of the study all the more interesting. Though it was a small study, the results were promising. Nearly half of the participants saw large increases in physical activity and nearly three-quarters had improvements in mood after fostering their pups. More than half of the participants met someone new in their neighborhood on a dog walk. Most participants adopted their foster dog after the six-week foster period, and some maintained improvements in physical activity and well-being at the end of the study.
With the promising data from that study, Potter was able to see which metrics and methods were the best for helping find answers to her original question—and many others that popped up throughout this experiment. She hopes to do more studies with foster dogs and cats in the future.
An interest in healthy aging
Armed with questions and hypotheses that occurred to her during one of her earliest studies, Project Rover,Potter decided to double down on her interest in how dogs impact physical activity and health in the older population. In Project Rover, Potter had worked with people over the age of 60, but now she wanted to push the age up a bit higher to see how an older generation would be impacted. She recruited 70- to 84-year-olds to be part of a new observational study called the Lifestyle, Brain, and Cognitive Health Study. The participant pool was divided into dog owners and those who were dog-free. Then, for one week, they were asked to go about their normal lives while activity monitors tracked their activity levels. At the end of the week, participants returned to UMass to have a brain scan and take the NIH Toolbox Cognition Battery to test their cognitive function and fluid cognition abilities like problem solving, response time, and ability to adapt to new situations. Ideally, at the end of this type of study, Potter would see improvements across the board with faster response times, more creative problem-solving ideas, and faster transitions to situations.
Though the group size for this study was too small to make generalizations about the results, Potter is excited about the social connection aspect of the study, since most participants said they had met people through their dog and that those people had become friends. The benefit of having the small sample size is that Potter was able to test her methodology, as she plans to conduct wider studies.
What about the kids?
Did you know that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends kids exercise for at least 60 minutes a day? Unfortunately, roughly 40% of children in the United States fall well below that, contributing to a wave of preventable health issues, including mental health impacts. Sands, working on her dissertation under Potter’s tutelage, thought, if we want to create interventions for people, why not start them young? She set out to design the Kids Interacting with Dogs (KID) study, a child-friendly pilot to establish a baseline—starting with children who already had a family dog.
To start, Sands met with participating families over Zoom for orientation. “While the dogs were certainly not required to join the remote study orientation calls,” Sands explains, “most of the kids were really excited to introduce me to their dogs.” Even though it was a remote study, she did get to witness the strong family-dog bond firsthand.
Over a one-week period, the study tracked how frequently kids played with the family dog through data received from Actigraphs—Bluetooth accelerometers that also monitor proximity. Every member of the family wore them (Fido included). And, to Sands’s delight, many of the children immediately decorated the monitors for both them and their dogs. By processing the data coming in, Sands was able to see how many cumulative minutes the kids spent with the dogs, how much they walked, and how actively they played.
Surprisingly, only one-third of the time kids were active with their dog was spent walking and (maybe less surprising to anyone who spends time near children or once was one), the other two-thirds were spent playing. That is notable because adult-focused studies show that owners spend the majority of their active time walking their dog and very little time engaged in play. This kid-specific study opens up new ways to explore the development of future physical activity interventions based on play.
Down the leash
Both Potter and Sands are passionate about finding enjoyable interventions that can improve wellness on a large scale. Potter’s dream is to set up an assistance program that pairs students with older or disabled members of the community who need a little help caring for their dogs. Both the community members and the students would reap the benefits of having a dog in their orbit, as well as experiencing a new, intergenerational human connection.
“One of the cool things about this line of research is that even though physical activity is our primary focus, there are social, emotional, and even academic benefits in human-animal interaction,” Potter shares. “So, there’s the potential for this much more holistic impact.” She says, “This can open up opportunities to areas where we can potentially collaborate with the researchers that are more focused on the animal side of it.” On a grander scale, Potter and Sands hope their research can create a viable, reproducible, scalable public health intervention program based on Potter’s idea. They also hope their research can inform changes around rental properties so people who want to be pet parents can find more housing options.
For now, we can all use these findings to inspire our own interventions. “When the bond is there, people will go to the end of the earth for their pet,” says Potter. It’s heartening to learn that bettering our pets’ lives can improve our own health and wellness too. And they don’t need you to go to the end of the earth for them—just to the end of the block.
Coming through the door from a hard day’s work to be greeted by the irrepressible joy of a dog bounding towards you, like they haven’t seen you in years, can be as satisfying as returning to an actual human partner, according to a new study.
Raising a furry companion like a cat or dog can bring you the same psychological benefits as getting married or earning an extra £70,000 a year, researchers at Kent University have found.
Using the “life satisfaction” approach, economists can translate intangible assets like friendship and family into a hypothetical income.
The research conducted on 2,500 British families found that owning a pet was linked to an increase in life satisfaction of 3-4 points on a scale of 1-7, similar to values obtained for meeting with friends and relatives regularly.
The study’s authors say they suspect that many people don’t actually realise how important their pets are for them (Getty Images/iStockphoto)
Economists have shown that marriage, compared to being single, is worth around £70,000 a year. Separation, on the other hand, is equivalent to around minus £170,000 a year.
Dr Adelina Gschwandtner of the University of Kent, the lead author of the new study, toldThe Timesshe was inspired by a paper that put a price tag on human friendship.
“I thought, ‘well, if it’s possible for friends, why not for pets?’”
“I understand why some people might be sceptical [about the £70,000 value],” she said.
“Given that pets are considered by many as best friends and family members, these values appear to be plausible … I also suspect that many people don’t actually realise how important their pets are for them.”
Simply stroking our pets can lower the levels of the stress hormone cortisol in our bodies, leading to a calmer approach to life and thus positively impacting our blood pressure and make you less likely to suffer from clinical depression.
Dr Gschwandtner added: “This research answers the question whether overall pet companions are good for us with a resounding ‘Yes’.
“Pets care for us and there is a significant monetary value associated with their companionship. This information can be used for health care practice and policy aiming to increase well-being and life satisfaction of humans involving pets.”
The research follows a 2022 Pets at Home study that found more than one-quarter of people asked preferred to see their pet over their partner after a day at work.
Loneliness has become an increased concern nationally since the pandemic. However, studies have shown companionship with dogs can greatly reduce the effects. (VCU Center of Human-Animal Interaction)
Long known as man’s best friend, dogs are being embraced even more now as a means of combatting loneliness. In one study, frequent interactions with dogs, either through ownerships or through long-term interventions, have been associated with positive psychological outcomes across the human lifespan.
“They are skilled at socializing with humans, sensitive to our emotional states and gestures – they can communicate using complex cues and form complex attachment relationships with humans,” said Nancy Gee, Ph.D., C-AISS, professor of psychiatry and the director of Virginia Commonwealth University’s Center for Human-Animal Interaction and Bill Balaban Chair in Human-Animal Interaction. “Their attachment to their human owners mirrors that of human babies to their mothers.”
Gee, whose been studying the relationship between therapy dogs and humans for more than two decades, spoke with VCU Health News about how interactions with dogs can relieve loneliness and increase connection with others.
How can dogs combat human loneliness?
Dogs are thought to fulfill the four roles of an attachment figure: They are enjoyable, comforting, missed when absent and sought in times of distress. Adults and children alike confide in their pets because they relieve us from the worry of confidentiality, judgments, or meeting expectations.
When humans interact with a dog in a calm way – where they are stroking the dog and making eye contact, or even talking to the dog – we see that both species release oxytocin (bonding/feel-good hormone), and their cortisol (stress hormone) levels drop. Additionally, their blood pressure and muscle tension lower, and their mood elevates.
When you combine these responses together, it indicates the interactions are relaxing and enjoyable, which helps to reduce a person’s overall experience of loneliness.
Is there a difference from other animals?
Probably, yes, but there is not enough research on the subject to know for certain. We do know that dogs are unique in the animal kingdom. Through domestication and selection, dogs emerged from the grey wolf over a period of at least 35,000 years, and there is probably no other species on the planet as well-matched to human social needs as dogs.
What are common types of service dogs, and do they differ in addressing human loneliness?
There are three prominent classifications:
A Service Dog (also called an Assistance Dog) has one handler who has a medically recognized disability. The dog is specially trained to assist that one person (their handler) with some aspect of that disability. For example, some dogs are trained to alert a person with a seizure disorder that a seizure is about to occur. This will allow the person to take medicine, call for assistance and/or get into a safe place/position so that they are not harmed during the actual seizure. Service Dogs are covered under the American’s with Disabilities Act and are granted access to public facilities and housing that otherwise excludes pets.
An Emotional Support Animal can be any animal species and requires no specific training. An ESA supports one person with a mental disability by comforting that person in a way that reduces symptoms. ESA status is determined by a mental health professional who writes a letter attesting to the animal’s role and housing status if pets are otherwise not allowed. However, ESAs are not permitted any other public access.
A Therapy Dog is handled by one person, but the dog’s job is to interact with many people who may benefit from the interaction. Therapy dogs, like those in our center’s Dogs on Call program, are granted access to facilities and transportation based on the permission of the administration of the facility or transportation provider, and the requirements of the program in which the dogs participate.
Currently, there is very little research that compares the three classifications of animals and the effects of SDs or ESAs in reducing loneliness. However, Dogs on Call specifically, and other therapy dogs in general, have been found to significantly reduce loneliness in the people they visit.
Does human age matter in regard to loneliness and the benefits of interacting with dogs?
We have results back from our own randomized clinical trials showing that for older adults and for adults with mental illness, interacting with Dogs on Call dogs and handlers is effective at reducing loneliness.
We’ve just completed data collection on our pediatric study, so we don’t know the answer just yet, but we have reason to believe that across the human lifespan, interacting with a therapy dog can reduce loneliness. Additionally, one study showed that adolescents derive more satisfaction from, and engage in less conflict with, their pets than with their human siblings.
Source: VCU Health (Virginia Commonwealth University)
A new study from Trinity College Dublin suggests that older adults who regularly walk their dogs show improved balance and fewer falls compared to their peers.
The research, published in the Journals of Gerontology, examined data from over 4,000 community-dwelling adults aged 60 and older, finding that 15% were regular dog walkers, defined as walking their dogs four or more times per week.
“Regular dog walking was associated with better mobility, with a 1.4 second faster Timed-Up-and-Go test on average,” the study noted. “Regular dog walkers also had a 40% lower likelihood of unexplained falls over the last 2 years and a 20% lower likelihood of current fear of falling in fully-adjusted regression models.”
The research also found that simply owning a dog without regularly walking it did not provide the same benefits. Dog owners who didn’t regularly walk their pets showed no reduction in mobility problems or falls, suggesting the physical activity of dog walking, rather than pet ownership alone, drives the improvements.
Regular dog walkers in the study tended to be younger, used fewer medications, and had lower rates of heart disease. They were also more likely to have never smoked, suggesting an overall healthier lifestyle profile.
The study observed that almost 13% of participants owned dogs but didn’t walk them regularly. This group showed higher rates of mobility concerns and fear of falling compared to regular dog walkers, further emphasizing the importance of consistent dog walking activity.
The findings add to growing evidence that dog walking can serve as a consistent form of physical activity that helps maintain mobility and reduce fall risk among older adults.
DoggyMom.com 