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A new study is showing that dog owners experienced a greater reduction of stress and loneliness compared to cat owners and participants without pets during the reopening and recovery periods of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Researchers at Purdue University set out to study how well pet owners fared compared to those who didn’t own pets.
That study found that pet owners grew closer to their pets during the pandemic, but the relationship between pet ownership and mental health proved to be more complex.
“People felt closer toward their pets during the COVID-19 pandemic even though the pet ownership did not mitigate stress and loneliness. Dog ownership and cat ownership acted differently on mental health, but the difference between them could be partially explained away by the owner-pet relationship,” according to the researchers in a media release.
Read more about the study here.
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