Reasons Why Dogs Are Better Than Cats

Dogs always seem to make really BIG headlines when they’ve done something bad. It’s just the way it is. There’s little doubt that there is a groundswell of people who simply do not like – maybe even hate – dogs and eagerly await their next opportunity to knock them.

We dog owners know the great benefits that dog ownership brings us, but next time you find yourself having to try and explain just how and why dogs have earned their place by our side all throughout the world, here’s some of the very real, very solid reasons…

1 Dogs will make you healthier – fact!

If you want to live a healthier life get a dog.  Dr Deborah Wells a psychologist from Queen’s University, Belfast, said dog owners tend to have lower blood pressure and cholesterol. Writing in the British Journal of Health Psychologyshe revealed how pet owners tended to generally be in better health than the average person.

2 Dog owners have fewer minor ailments and serious medical problems.
It’s long been theorised that dogs can aid recovery from serious illnesses such as heart attacks, and it’s now well proven that dogs can spot oncoming illness, even the presence of cancer or an impending seizure. We haven’t even begun to scrape the surface of how much dogs can still do to aid human health.

3 Having a pet can help children develop better social skills.
Researchers at the University of Leicester discovered that children up to the age of six, living  in pet-owning families have better social skills, better speech, better co-ordination, more confidence and will be less likely to suffer from allergies by the time they start their second year of school.

4 Dogs aid children cope with stress.
A five-year-study of 600 children aged 3-18 years highlighted how children in pet owning homes who suffer from learning difficulties or come from a home where parents have split up, are better able to cope with stress than those children who don’t have access to the companionship of a pet.

5. No more sneezing.
It is traditionally thought that allergy sufferers shouldn’t have a furry or feathered friend. However, recent scientific evidence suggests that the opposite may hold true and pets have an important role to play in building up a child’s immune system. Children who live with a cat or dog in their first years of life have a lower incidence of hay fever and asthma and are less likely to develop animal-related allergies. Recent studies also show that the immune systems of children (particularly between the ages of five and eight) of pet-owning families are more stable than those of children from non-pet owning families – the result being that making pet-owning children are better able to fend off illness. (see PHC ‘Pets & Allergies’ leaflet on this website).

The latest research
New research was presented at the 10th International Conference on Human Animal Interaction in October 2004. This was the first time this triennial conference came to the UK.

Some of the highlights are summarised below:

A PET ALL DAY KEEPS THE DOCTOR AWAY – Bruce Headey, Melbourne, Australia
A large-scale survey of more than 11,000 Australians, Chinese and Germans proved pet-owners enjoy better health. Over a five year period, pet owners made 15 – 20% fewer annual visits to the doctor than non pet-owners. Results showed that the healthiest group – those who went to the doctor least – was those who continuously owned a pet. The next healthiest group had obtained a pet during the study period, having not had one before. The least healthy groups were people who had never owned a pet, or no longer did.

KIDS WITH PETS TAKE FEWER SICK DAYS – June McNicholas, Scotland
Dr June McNicholas, a health psychologist, presented findings of a study which examined 256 children (aged five to eleven years) in three schools in England and Scotland. The key findings were:

* Absenteeism through illness was significantly less among pet-owning children
* Children in reception and Year 1 classes had 18 per cent and 13 per cent better attendance respectively than non-pet owning children
* Pet-owning children attended school for an additional three weeks extra school compared to non-pet owning children (aged five to seven years).

6 Stroking a cat or dog can bring down blood pressure and one study of 369 heart-attack survivors found that those who had dogs were less likely to die within a year than those who didn’t.

6 The British Medical Journal found that pets can often act as social catalysts’. This was particularly important for those at risk of social isolation, such as the elderly or those with physical disabilities. A Warwick University study said 40% of dog owners say they make friends more easily due to their pet.

7 Pets can help recently widowed people deal with stress. A UK study revealed that three months after bereavement, pet owners had fewer physical symptoms, such as crying, than non-pet owners.

8 Cats can help you overcome stress. A Cats Protection study of 500 cat owners aged over 55 revealed 82% found that their cat helped them overcome feelings of stress; 62% said cat ownership helped overcome feelings of loneliness and 75% sometimes preferred to share their feelings with their cat rather than a partner or friend.

The same survey also looked at 100 cat owners aged 13 years or under where 80% said their cat helped them get on better with family and friends while 87% of children regard their cat as a close friend’.

9 Whilst it may seem obvious, owning a dog is a sure fire way to make sure you – and your pet – get some regular exercise by taking it out for walks on a daily basis – dog owners often reason that their dogs keep them fitter than they would do if they didn’t have the incentive to take the dog out.

10 Dogs make us laugh. They’re naturally comedic. Don’t believe me?