So with all that's happening around us with COVID-19 at the moment we're all
feeling a little bit more stressed and overwhelmed, especially our children.
Now one of the things that may be helping many families through this time is their
pets and there's lots of research to show the mental and developmental
benefits for children having pets in their lives. Some of these benefits
include lowering stress levels, less feelings of loneliness, having greater
feelings of self-esteem but also empathy for others, greater feelings of trust and
more sharing, caring and helping behaviors but some of the benefits also
are physical. So we know that having pets as part of our lives and particularly dogs
in children they're more physically active. So dogs are great for motivating
our parents and children, families to be active through activity and active play
at home but also going on family dog walks and we know that being physically
active is also good for our mental health. Now the Australian Government
recommends that Australian children should be doing 60 minutes of moderate
to vigorous physical activity per day. Now this is the activity that causes a
bit of huffing and puffing and what better way to do that than through active
play at home with our pets or going on a family dog walk. The physical
activity benefits for children include things like stronger muscles and bones,
also doing better at school, better levels of concentration and attention
when doing school work, feeling better overall physically and mentally and some
developmental benefits as well and of course being physically active is
important for keeping a healthy weight status.
So what is it about pets that can be so helpful? Well first of all they provide a
great deal of companionship, for many families they are considered an
important family member. They also provide an unconditional source of love
and affection and they help children learn about a sense of responsibility
and also routine in the daily process of feeding and exercising and making sure
they've got fresh water. They also are a great source of physical activity.
They motivate us to be active children in particular opportunities for active play
and family dog walks, but considering all that is going on around us
right now, they are really important in their role as a social buffer from stress and anxiety.
Our own research has shown recently that those children who have a
pet do better in terms of their social and emotional development.
Our research found that children who had a dog compared to no pet at all had a 20 to 30 percent
reduction in abnormal scores on a social and emotional development scale.
Now cats also are important and provided these developmental
benefits compared to not having any pets and we also saw some added benefits for
those children who don't have any other siblings.
In terms of the mental and developmental benefits of pets for children the type
of pet probably doesn't matter too much the key thing is that your child is
connected and well attached to that pet but when we think about some of the
physical benefits, particularly the physical activity that our pets can
promote it is the family dog that wins the race here.
It's important to think about how a pet would fit within your family and your
lifestyle so the number of children you have, the ages, what other pets you may
already have at home. Not only how the pet would fit in your
family now, but also after the pandemic because we have pets in our lives
generally for a considerable amount of time.
Getting a pet is a really important decision.
Having a pet comes with a number of responsibilities
related to caring for it so exercising, feeding, vaccinating, training and
socialising it amongst many others and many of these responsibilities do come
with a financial cost, although as I've already indicated there's a huge number
of benefits of having pets. Now there are some shorter term options that are
available so many animal shelters are at present offering the fostering of cats
and dogs to people and this is a great option to consider whether having a pet
works for your family but it's really important to do your homework
not just to see how that would work now in our current circumstances, but later
on afterwards as well and one of the great things you can do is give your
local vet a call and have a chat to them to see what they will advise in terms of
having and bringing a pet into your family at this time.