The Value of Companion Dogs as a Source of Social Support for Their Owners: Findings From a Pre-pandemic Representative Sample and a Convenience Sample Obtained During the COVID-19 Lockdown in Spain

Abstract

Dogs are a source of companionship and comfort for their owners, but the degree to which this might translate into real emotional and social support has not been quantified. Emotional and social support are essential to help people to get through personal crises such as bereavement. In this study we characterize the social support owners obtain from their dogs, provide evidence of how widespread this social support is amongst dog-owners, and show how social support from dogs can increase during a crisis (using the COVID-19 pandemic as an example). We collected data from a representative population-based sample of Spanish dog-owners and found that most respondents said that their dogs helped them to get through tough times. They got comfort from physical contact with their dogs, shared activities with them and treated them as confidants in a similar way to friends and family. These are all key aspects of social support, and dogs offer the advantage of being more available than human sources of support. It would be expected that the support that dogs provide would be increased during a time of personal crisis and when we looked at data collected from a convenience sample of Spanish dog-owners during the COVID-19 confinement that is what we found; during the confinement owners engaged in more shared activities with their dogs, hugged them more often and turned to them more as a source of companionship and comfort (p < 0.0001 in all cases). However, although owners did confide more in their dogs (p < 0.0001), the effect was not as great as for other aspects of social support. We suspect that this is because people were able to use telecommunications such as video conferencing to maintain their human confidant relationships. Our findings indicate that dogs can substitute for humans as sources of some kinds of social support when conventional sources are unavailable. Our conclusion is that where a dog is present in a household, it should be regarded as an important resource for social support. This should be considered when designing clinical interventions and when public health decisions are being made.

Cat–Owner Relationship and Cat Behaviour: Effects of the COVID-19 Confinement and Implications for Feline Management

“…In the specific scenario of the COVID-19 pandemic, multiple studies found that pets functioned as stress buffers for their owners. For instance, taking dogs for a walk [ 6 ] or engaging in social activities (e.g., affiliative, play) with them [ 7 ] was emotionally beneficial for the majority of dog owners. As for cats, in Jezierski et al’s study [ 8 ], 84.6% of cat owners reported to have benefitted from the presence of their cat, mostly because it helped to alleviate the mental tension generated by the pandemic.…”

Motivations of Human Helping Behavior towards Dogs

“…The maladaptive schemas from different domains were indeed positively associated with COVID-19 anxiety and psychological distress [ 56 ]. The affection between human and dogs is well known as an effective way to reduce stress during stress-prone conditions and to help in buffering depression and anxiety in the context of social isolation [ 19 , 20 , 23 , 57 ]. Indeed, an increased in human willingness to engage in interaction with pets in the early phase of COVID-19 pandemic was noted [ 27 ].…”

“…Indeed, the relationship and interactions with dogs have been crucial to buffer and reduce the negative psychological impact of COVID-19 during the last two years [ 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 ]. Dogs have offered social support by physical contact with the owners [ 23 ] and an effective distraction from unsettling feelings during the pandemic [ 24 ], as well as a valuable motivation to engage in shared activities [ 25 ]. Most importantly, the interaction with animals has reduced or minimized the feeling of loneliness due to social distance measures [ 22 , 26 ].…”

Animal Transmission of SARS-CoV-2 and the Welfare of Animals during the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…Previous research suggests that dogs facilitate human social interactions [208], and during the pandemic, the majority of participants with dogs surveyed in a study in the USA reported that they socialized more often with others than did participants without dogs, presumably in part through walking the dog outside [209]. A similar study of Spanish dog owners showed that pet dogs (more so than other humans) served as social companions for their owners during pandemic lockdowns and that attachment to their pets among dog owners increased during this time [210].…”

“…A survey of 6004 dog owners in the United Kingdom showed that, as a consequence of government-mandated lockdowns, dogs spent less time alone, were walked less often, and had fewer interactions with humans who were not part of their households or with other dogs [197]. In other surveys, dog owners have reported that their dogs during lockdown have been more demanding of attention [209][210][211]. These behaviors foreshadow possible separation anxiety as pandemic restrictions relax and dog owners return to work outside of the home.…”