According to a preliminary study released today, February 23, 2022, owning a pet may be linked to slower cognitive decline in older adults.
Tiffany Braley, a member of the American Academy of Neurology and the University of Michigan Medical Center, said that prior studies have suggested that the human- animal bond may have health benefits.
The study looked at the cognitive data from 1,369 older adults with an average age of 65 who had normal cognitive skills at the start of the study. A total of 53% owned pets, and 32% were long-term pet owners. The study participants were white, Black, Hispanic, and 3% were of another race.
The Health and Retirement Study is a large study of Medicare beneficiaries. People were given multiple cognitive tests. The researchers used the cognitive tests to create a score for each person. The tests included in the score were word recall, subtraction, and numerical counting. Researchers estimated the associations between years of pet ownership and cognitive function.
The cognitive scores of pet owners decreased at a slower rate. The difference was strongest among long-term pet owners. The study showed that long-term pet owners had a cognitive score that was 1.2 points higher than non-pet owners. Black adults, college-educated adults and men were found to have stronger cognitive benefits from longer pet ownership. More research is needed to understand the reasons for these associations.
As stress can negatively affect cognitive function, the potential stress-buffering effects of pet ownership could provide a plausible reason for our findings. More research is needed to confirm our results and identify underlying mechanisms.
The study only assessed the length of pet ownership at a single point, so there was no information regarding ongoing pet ownership.
The study will be presented at the 74th Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Neurology, which will be held in Seattle, April 2 to 7, 2022.
The study was supported by the National Institute on Aging.
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