Health benefit of pets

Throughout history, animals have played a significant role in human customs, legends and religions. Primitive people found that human-animal relationships were important to their very survival and pet keeping was common in hunter-gatherer societies.

In our time, the great increase in pet ownership may reflect a largely urban population’s often unsatisfied need for intimacy, nurturance and contact with nature. However, it is impossible to determine when animals first were used specifically to promote physical and psychological health.

The role of social support in cardiovascular health – a question that hasn’t been resolved despite considerable research — provides a rational framework for studying the possible benefits of pets beyond mere enjoyment and affection.

Relaxation, meditation and stress management have become recognized therapies for reducing blood pressure before pharmacological methods are prescribed.

It therefore seems reasonable that pets, who provide faithful companionship to many people, also might promote greater psychosocial stability for their owners and a measure of protection from heart disease.

Despite the lack of data showing this, those with pets will be delighted to know that they reap unexpected health and financial benefits (from lower health care costs) in addition to enjoying the companionship of the family cat or dog.

However, pet ownership is a personal decision reflecting an individual preference. A companion animal may not necessarily be appropriate for everyone; but withholding a pet from someone who wants one could be as much a source of distress as forcing a pet on someone who doesn’t want one.

A number of empirical studies have also investigated how children interact with pets and how they view their relationships with animals.

An examination of children’s attitudes toward pets reveals that many of them ascribe a rich range of social attributes to these animals. Some of these attributes – especially love and affection, companionship, intimacy and nurturance — also are used in the children’s description of their relationships with other people.

Most children rate their own pets as very high on these characteristics while they rate neighborhood animals as high on companionship but not on love and affection.

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