Puppy Love: Pet Owners Are Happier, Healthier

Pets are good sources of social and emotional support for everyone, not just people facing health challenges, new research suggests.

animal free circuses

"We observed evidence that pet owners fared better, both in terms of well-being outcomes and individual differences, than nonowners on several dimensions,” study researcher Allen McConnell, of Miami University in Ohio, said in a statement. “Specifically, pet owners had greater self-esteem, were more physically fit, tended to be less lonely, were more conscientious, were more extroverted, tended to be less fearful and tended to be less preoccupied than nonowners.” [America's Favorite Pets]

Pet ownership has been on the rise the last few decades. A study in 2006 by the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association determined that about two-thirds of American households (71.1 million) have at least one pet. In comparison, 56 percent of households had a pet in 1988, the first year the survey was conducted.

McConnell's group conducted several studies of pet owners.

First they surveyed 217 people, determining differences between pet owners and nonowners in terms of well-being, personality type and attachment style. They found that pet owners were happier, healthier and better adjusted than were nonowners.

The researchers then studied 56 dog owners, finding that pet owners who thought their dogs increased their feelings of belonging, self-esteem and meaningful existence had greater well-being than those who didn't perceive that their pet fulfilled their social needs.

They then asked 96 pet owners who were undergraduates to remember and write about a time they were excluded. They were then asked to either write about their favorite pet, their favorite friend or to draw a map of their college campus. Both writing about a pet or a friend reduced the feelings of rejection brought forth by thinking about being excluded. Surprisingly, both pets and friends staved off the feelings of rejection equally.

All in all, the researchers found that even healthy people benefit from pets. Pet owners are just as close to key people in their lives as to their animals, which serve as important sources of social and emotional support.

“The present work presents considerable evidence that pets benefit the lives of their owners, both psychologically and physically, by serving as an important source of social support,” the researchers wrote in the paper, published online by the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. “Whereas past work has focused primarily on pet owners facing significant health challenges … the present study establishes that there are many positive consequences for everyday people.”

Source:  Jennifer Welsh
http://www.livescience.com/14983-cat-dog-mental-health.html

You can follow LiveScience staff writer Jennifer Welsh on Twitter @microbelover. Follow LiveScience for the latest in science news and discoveries on Twitter @livescience and on Facebook.

Friends with Benefits: Pets Make Us Happier, Healthier

Social support is essential for psychological and physical well-being, but are people the only source for our sense of belongingness? For example, lonely people are often advised to get a dog or a cat to quell their social isolation, but is it really the case that pets can fulfill one's social needs, serving to improve owners' happiness, well-being, and even their physical health? A new study suggests the answer is a resounding yes!

Research conducted in our lab just published on-line in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology indicates that pets provide meaningful social support for owners, improving their lives. Whereas some past research found that people facing serious health challenges (e.g., recent heart attacks, HIV) fare better with pets, the current work found that everyday people can benefit from pet ownership as well.

In three different studies, we found consistent evidence that pets represent important social relationships, conferring significant benefits to their owners (McConnell et al., in press). In one study involving 217 community members, pet owners exhibited greater self-esteem, were more physically fit, were less lonely, were more conscientious, were more socially outgoing, and had healthier relationship styles (i.e., they were less fearful and less preoccupied) than nonowners. Another interesting finding was that pet owners reported receiving as much support from their pets as they did from their family members (e.g., siblings, parents), and that people reported being closer to their pets as they were also closer to other people. Thus, people did not turn to pets because their human social support was poor -- instead, owners seem to extend their general human social competencies to their pets as well.

In a second study, we found that 56 dog owners who reported that their pet fulfilled their social needs more effectively (e.g., felt that their dogs provided a greater sense of belongingness, meaningful existence, control, and self-esteem) were happier and healthier (e.g., less depressed, greater self-esteem, less lonely, less stressed out). In this study, people benefited in terms of health and well-being both from human sources and from pet sources of social support independently, and once again, there was no evidence that people relied on pets more when their human social support was lacking.

Although Studies 1 and 2 were correlational, we conducted a third study in the lab to experimentally examine the ability of pets to benefit people. In this experiment, 97 pet owners came to the lab and some were induced to feel socially rejected while others were not. Afterwards, pet owners either (1) wrote about their pet, (2) wrote about their best friend, or (3) drew a map of campus (a control condition). As expected, those who drew a map after experiencing social rejection felt worse at the end of the experiment than they were at the beginning of the study, showing that our social rejection manipulation was effective. However, those who wrote about their dog were just as happy as those who wrote about their best friend (both groups did not show any negative feelings, even after the rejection experience was induced). In short, thinking about one's pet staved off the negativity that accompanies social isolation as effectively as thinking about one's best friend. To borrow from the old adage, although pets may not be one's best friend, pets may be every bit as good!

Some additional observations

Overall, our research found that pet ownership was very positive. Pet owners were happier and healthier than nonowners, and thoughts of one's pet could insulate one from feeling down following a social rejection experience. Interestingly, there was no support for the "crazy cat lady" hypothesis (i.e., individuals who turn to animals because they "don't click" with people) -- if anything, people benefited more from their pets when they had better human relationships. For example, introverted people (who aren't outgoing) or narcissists (who put themselves first and feel superior to others) were less likely, rather than more likely, to enjoy positive consequences from their pets.

Also, in our research, we found no evidence that type of pet (e.g., dogs vs. cats) mattered. People were able to anthropomorphize a variety of animals species in our studies (e.g., dogs, cats, horses, lizards, even a goat) and it appears that "the power of pets" is more about what lies in the owners' mind than what lies at their feet, at the end of a leash, or in an aquarium.

Finally, one might wonder what this research has to do with "the self," which is the focus of this blog. One thing that we know about close, important others in our lives (e.g., spouses, best friends) is that they become "included in the self." That is, key people in our lives actually become enmeshed cognitively and emotionally in our self-concept. For example, "blurry lines" evolve between people's sense of self and close others, often perceiving one's own traits in close others and seeing close others' qualities as descriptive of the self. Healthy individuals empathize with close others in their lives, adopting their perspective and sharing their feelings instinctively. Our work demonstrated that pets can function similarly -- they become as much a part of the self as many family members, which undoubtedly, contributes to their power in promoting our health and happiness.

To conclude, we would not contend that pets represent a panacea for psychological well-being. For instance, our data would suggest that individuals with psychological shortcomings (e.g., negative personality types, less effective relationship styles) may find less value from pet ownership than individuals who are "real people people." Also, pet ownership entails considerable responsibility and involvement (e.g., time, money, physical engagement), and just like with any human relationship, having a low quality connection with one's pet certainly will diminish the positive consequences one can enjoy. Yet, our research indicates that for everyday people, pets are often "friends with benefits" and that one's health and happiness improves in a meaningful fashion from pet ownership.

Source: Allen R McConnell Ph.D.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-social-self/201107/friends-benefits-pets-make-us-happier-healthier

Be happy: Your genes may thank you for it

But different types of happiness have different effects, UCLA study shows

A good state of mind — that is, your happiness — affects your genes, scientists say. In the first study of its kind, researchers from UCLA's Cousins Center for Psychoneuroimmunology and the University of North Carolina examined how positive psychology impacts human gene expression.

 

What they found is that different types of happiness have surprisingly different effects on the human genome.

 

People who have high levels of what is known as eudaimonic well-being — the kind of happiness that comes from having a deep sense of purpose and meaning in life (think Mother Teresa) — showed very favorable gene-expression profiles in their immune cells. They had low levels of inflammatory gene expression and strong expression of antiviral and antibody genes.

 

However, people who had relatively high levels of hedonic well-being — the type of happiness that comes from consummatory self-gratification (think most celebrities) — actually showed just the opposite. They had an adverse expression profile involving high inflammation and low antiviral and antibody gene expression.

 

The report appears in the current online edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

 

For the last 10 years, Steven Cole, a UCLA professor of medicine and a member of the UCLA Cousins Center, and his colleagues, including first author Barbara L. Fredrickson at the University of North Carolina, have been examining how the human genome responds to stress, misery, fear and all kinds of negative psychology.

 

In this study, though, the researchers asked how the human genome might respond to positive psychology. Is it just the opposite of stress and misery, or does positive well-being activate a different kind of gene expression program?

 

The researchers examined the biological implications of both hedonic and eudaimonic well-being through the lens of the human genome, a system of some 21,000 genes that has evolved fundamentally to help humans survive and be well.

 

Previous studies had found that circulating immune cells show a systematic shift in baseline gene-expression profiles during extended periods of stress, threat or uncertainty. Known as conserved transcriptional response to adversity, or CTRA, this shift is characterized by an increased expression of genes involved in inflammation and a decreased expression of genes involved in antiviral responses.

 

This response, Cole noted, likely evolved to help the immune system counter the changing patterns of microbial threat that were ancestrally associated with changing socio-environmental conditions; these threats included bacterial infection from wounds caused by social conflict and an increased risk of viral infection associated with social contact.

 

"But in contemporary society and our very different environment, chronic activation by social or symbolic threats can promote inflammation and cause cardiovascular, neurodegenerative and other diseases and can impair resistance to viral infections," said Cole, the senior author of the research.

 

In the present study, the researchers drew blood samples from 80 healthy adults who were assessed for hedonic and eudaimonic well-being, as well as potentially confounding negative psychological and behavioral factors. The team used the CTRA gene-expression profile to map the potentially distinct biological effects of hedonic and eudaimonic well-being.

 

And while those with eudaimonic well-being showed favorable gene-expression profiles in their immune cells and those with hedonic well-being showed an adverse gene-expression profile, "people with high levels of hedonic well-being didn't feel any worse than those with high levels of eudaimonic well-being," Cole said. "Both seemed to have the same high levels of positive emotion. However, their genomes were responding very differently even though their emotional states were similarly positive.

 

"What this study tells us is that doing good and feeling good have very different effects on the human genome, even though they generate similar levels of positive emotion," he said. "Apparently, the human genome is much more sensitive to different ways of achieving happiness than are conscious minds."

Other authors on the study included Jesusa M.G. Arevalo and Jeffrey Ma, both of UCLA, and Karen M. Grewen, Kimberly A. Coffey, Sara B. Algoe and Ann M. Firestine of the University of North Carolina.

 

The research was supported by National Institutes of Health grants R01NR012899, R01CA116778 and P30AG107265.

Source:  By Mark Wheeler

http://newsroom.ucla.edu/releases/don-t-worry-be-happy-247644

Wow, goes to show that all I have been reading about serving others, having a sense of purpose in life actually is very true indeed - another reason to 'pay it forward' ?