Studies confirming how our dogs and cats helped us overcome the pandemic

Dogs, cats and other pets. Without them we would not have been able to overcome the darkest moments of the pandemic and science proves it

He is about to end up run over, his mother saves him

The years of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic have had and continue to have very heavy psychological implications for children, adolescents and the elderly, but if the infection curve is slowly decreasing, science agrees that those who during the lockdown had the good fortune of having a dog or a cat next to him, he experienced the pandemic in a different way, managing to overcome it with an extra gear: the presence of his own pet on which he relied even more than usual.

While our lives have been drastically disrupted and deprived of social contact, symptoms such as anxiety, depression and loneliness have been dealt with differently by families with pets. The reason why? The deep human-animal bond that is established between the owner and his dog, for example, capable of listening to us, reassuring us, making us smile and give us serenity and that emotional support that we so much needed in these periods of strong physical and psychological stress.

The role that pets played during the pandemic has often been underestimated, but although some have shamefully thought of adopting a dog only to be able to leave their home and circumvent the restrictions and then abandon it again with the renunciation of ownership, the importance their presence on us humans has been demonstrated by many researches, especially for people who live alone and who benefit from the company and love that their pet gives them.

A recent study of 6069 American teenagers by Dr. Megan K. Mueller of the Tufts Institute for Human-Animal Interaction - a body intent on studying the connections between animals and humans - proved that adolescents with cats and dogs had high levels of stress just like peers without, but managed to fight stress better thanks to strategies and habits given by contact with your pet. How this is possible is easy to understand: greater social interactions with your pet rather than with a screen, distractions and at the same time relaxation in taking care of the animal, emotional support in overcoming situations of insecurity and panic.

Having a dog or cat next to you is in effect the best therapy that you can ever ask for and the benefits of interaction are so many and in the long run they show more and more as science continues to observe and demonstrate.

Fonte: Anthrozoös

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