Kitty and Pooch can make you happier, healthier

A sense of community and social support is key to mental and physical well-being, according to experts. But can pets provide social support to meet some of those needs?

According to three studies just published online, Kitty and Pooch may make all the difference.

It's well-documented that people provide each other with life-enhancing social support. The researchers, from Miami University in Ohio and St. Louis University, set out to see if pets can "also fulfill one's social needs," according to the abstract of the studies, published this month in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, a publication of the American Psychological Association.

The first study showed that pet owners fared better on several measures of well-being, such as greater self-esteem and getting more exercise, as well as on differentiating measures such as how conscientious they were. The second study looked at entirely different people and found that pet owners "enjoyed better well-being when their pets fulfilled social needs better" and the pets were a "complement" to human interaction, rather than competing with them to provide support. The third study, conducted in the laboratory, showed that pets can be an antidote to feelings of rejection.

"The present work presents considerable evidence that pets benefit the lives of their owners, both psychologially and physically, by serving as an important source of social support," the researchers wrote.

"We observed evidence that pet owners fared better, both in terms of well-being outcomes and individual differences, than non-owners on several dimensions," lead author Allen R. McConnell, Ph.D. told USA Today.

"Specifically, pet owners had greater self-esteem, were more phsyically fit, tended to be less lonely, were more conscientious, were more extroverted, tended to be less fearful and tended to be less preoccupied than non-owners."