TY - JOUR
T1 - Dog and cat ownership predicts adolescents’ mental well-being
T2 - A population-based longitudinal study
AU - Endo, Kaori
AU - Yamasaki, Syudo
AU - Ando, Shuntaro
AU - Kikusui, Takefumi
AU - Mogi, Kazutaka
AU - Nagasawa, Miho
AU - Kamimura, Itsuka
AU - Ishihara, Junko
AU - Nakanishi, Miharu
AU - Usami, Satoshi
AU - Hiraiwa-Hasegawa, Mariko
AU - Kasai, Kiyoto
AU - Nishida, Atsushi
N1 - Funding Information:
Funding: This work was supported by a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research on Innovative Areas (23118002; Adolescent Mind & Self-Regulation) from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology of Japan. This study was also supported by JSPS KAKENHI (grant numbers JP16H06395, 16H06398, 16H06399, 16K21720, 16K15566, 16H03745, and 17H05931). This work was supported in part by the UTokyo Center for Integrative Science of Human Behavior (CiSHuB), the International Research Center for Neurointelligence (WPI-IRCN) at the University of Tokyo Institutes for Advanced Study (UTIAS), and the MEXT*-Supported Program for the Private University Research Branding Project (2016-2019).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
PY - 2020/2
Y1 - 2020/2
N2 - A potential association between pet ownership and mental well-being is suggested, but there is a shortage of high-quality longitudinal studies that consider probable differences among different species. We aimed to examine whether ownership of the most popular pets (dogs and cats) would predict mental well-being. The Tokyo Teen Cohort (TTC), a prospective population-based birth cohort study, had dog and cat ownership data at age 10 and mental well-being score at ages 10 and 12 from 2584 adolescents. Linear regression analysis with adjusting for covariates showed that dog ownership had a positive effect on mental well-being compared to no dog ownership, however, cat ownership had a negative effect compared to no cat ownership. Two-factor mixed-design analysis of variance showed that dog ownership predicted maintained mental well-being, while cat ownership predicted progressing decline of mental well-being. Thus, dog and cat ownership may have different effects on adolescents’ mental well-being, implying that the underlying mechanisms that are activated by these types of ownership may differ.
AB - A potential association between pet ownership and mental well-being is suggested, but there is a shortage of high-quality longitudinal studies that consider probable differences among different species. We aimed to examine whether ownership of the most popular pets (dogs and cats) would predict mental well-being. The Tokyo Teen Cohort (TTC), a prospective population-based birth cohort study, had dog and cat ownership data at age 10 and mental well-being score at ages 10 and 12 from 2584 adolescents. Linear regression analysis with adjusting for covariates showed that dog ownership had a positive effect on mental well-being compared to no dog ownership, however, cat ownership had a negative effect compared to no cat ownership. Two-factor mixed-design analysis of variance showed that dog ownership predicted maintained mental well-being, while cat ownership predicted progressing decline of mental well-being. Thus, dog and cat ownership may have different effects on adolescents’ mental well-being, implying that the underlying mechanisms that are activated by these types of ownership may differ.
KW - Adolescent
KW - Cats
KW - Cohort studies
KW - Dogs
KW - Pets
KW - Well-being
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85079070757&partnerID=8YFLogxK
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U2 - 10.3390/ijerph17030884
DO - 10.3390/ijerph17030884
M3 - Article
C2 - 32023841
AN - SCOPUS:85079070757
SN - 1661-7827
VL - 17
JO - International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
JF - International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
IS - 3
M1 - 884
ER -
