Why do some Owners Believe their Pets have Human Abilities? Study

These days many companion animals in the U.S. are perceived as family members. But some caretakers of dogs and cats view them as much more than family members. In fact, some people perceive their nonhuman animal family members as having cognitive abilities on par with human beings, believing their pets can think in a complex manner, understand the nuances of language and expression like apologies, experience emotional reactions such as guilt, shame, revenge or being offended, conceptualize abstract concepts like future and past, and so on. This assigning human cognitive capabilities to animals is what scientists refer to as “anthropomorphization”, or as people anthropomorphizing their animals. Researchers in the current study wanted to learn what conditions would foster these perceptions in human caretakers of pets.

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Study overview

The researchers in the current study hypothesized that the tendency to anthropomorphize companion animals is related to relationship behaviors (communication and making up) people have with their pets and their experiences of using the pet as social support.

The study included 527 participants (332 dog owners and 195 cat owners) from the Netherlands. The level of education: 43% of the participants had a lower or medium level of education and 57% had a high level of education. The mean age was 47, and 88% of participants were female and 12% male (1 “rather not say”). Twenty-six percent of the participants worked professionally with pets (shelter volunteer, groomer, veterinarian, behaviorist, etc.). The pet’s sex was 50% female. Pet age: 39% of pets were between 1 and 4 years of age, 29% between 5 and 8, and 22% between 9 and 14 years old, and the duration of the presence of most pets fell in the categories 2 to 5 years (30%) and 5 to 10 years (31%).

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Backstory

“Nowadays, pets such as cats and dogs, are kept mostly for companionship rather than for utilitarian purposes; attachment to pets has been shown to be relational rather than attributable. Most owners name their pet, talk to them, play and sleep with them, take their photographs, treat their illnesses, and mourn them when they die. Pets can fill relational voids in peoples’ lives or be an addition to human social support networks and perceiving a companion animal as member of an important social group is related to human well-being. Previous studies show that pets can occupy similar social niches as social partners, friends, family members, or even children, as pets can fulfill the human innate need to love and take care of another being.

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Anthropomorphic perceptions of pets’ social and cognitive abilities

“People differ in their human need to be socially connected to other beings. This “sociality motivation” seems to influence people’s tendency to think about animals as if they are human. Seeing companion animals as small human-like social entities might be related to the human tendency to attribute cognitive and social abilities to pets. In fact, this was found to be the case in a previous scientific study of owners of dogs and cats. Being a family member was associated with a stronger attribution of friendliness and intelligence to cats by their owners and when dog owners thought of their dogs as children, they rated them as more empathic. These findings suggest that people form (human-like) perceptions of their pets’ social role that might influence their behavior towards the pet.

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Besides the perceived social role of the pet, anthropomorphic perceptions of their pets’ social and cognitive abilities may influence their behavior towards the pet. Cognitive abilities refer to (conscious) intellectual activities with regard to individual reality, such as thinking, reasoning, or remembering, and are different from social or emotional abilities. Anthropomorphizing pets’ cognitive abilities may manifest in owners as beliefs about the pet being able to count or to think about the future. Social abilities refer to intellectual activities with regard to social reality and are related to insight into social (strategic) behaviors and social intentions of others. Anthropomorphizing pets’ social abilities may manifest as beliefs about the pet being able to understand human language or to take revenge when disappointed in the owner or experience complex social emotions such as jealousy and shame. Thus, the owners’ perceptions of cognitive and social abilities of their pet may also influence the interactions with their pet.

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Factors that influence anthropomorphizing one’s pets

“The perceived cognitive and social abilities of their pet, and the perceived social role of the pet, are expected to have various outcomes in the human-animal relationship. The present study focused on three relationship outcomes: (1) the presence of making up behaviors; (2) the type of communication behaviors; and (3) the experience of using the pet as social support. All three outcomes can only be understood to occur when people have formed certain perceptions of their pet. Making-up behavior is performed when important (human) relationships are under pressure. These behaviors are based on feelings of guilt that motivate to “repair” the relationship. Making-up behavior involves apologizing to the animal, for example for being a long time away from the animal or hurting the animal by accident. Communication behavior refers to behaviors with the goal to interact with another, such as talking and touching. Lastly, the experience of social support is a basic aspect of human relationships that also has been shown in relationships with animals. The attribution of abilities like “perceptive”, “empathetic”, and “considerate” to pets makes it possible for them to be a source of emotional support and friendship for humans, and that being among pets can mitigate the effects of stress. One central question in the present study is whether the perceived social role of the pet, and the perceived cognitive and social abilities of their pet are related to these three relationship outcomes.

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One last assumption in the present study was that the perceptions of the social role of a pet (e.g., a child or a family member) can only develop when people endorse anthropomorphic attributions of abilities; they may perceive and treat the pet in a certain social role only when they assume that the pet has cognitive and social abilities.

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Results overview

“The more pet owners rated the experience/presence of mental abilities of their pet to be similar to that of humans, the more they displayed making-up behavior towards their pet, and the stronger they experienced social support from their pet. Although no causal relationships can be inferred from our data, making-up behavior is motivated and shaped by people’s (anthropomorphic) perceptions: Why bother “repairing” a relationship when the other would not be equipped to understand at least the making-up behavior in part. Similarly, social support can be conceptualized as being (partly) determined by anthropomorphization as ‘’People create agents of social support by anthropomorphizing their pets”. The study results indicate that in order to engage in communication behavior (e.g., petting, kissing, talking) it is not necessary to attribute human abilities to the pet. It may be that the perception that the pet at the least “experiences something” in reaction to these behaviors is sufficient to generate the behavior in the pet owner when they have a social need.

A central test in the current study was whether the relationship of the two measures of anthropomorphization with the three outcomes was mediated by the perception of the pet’s social role–that is, the extent to which the pet was perceived in terms of being a child, a friend, a family member, and provider of love. The results suggested that anthropomorphization leads to perception of the pet’s social role, which then leads to engaging in communication and making-up behaviors and the experience of social support.

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Other findings

“Dog owners attributed more mental abilities to their pet compared to cat owners, they perceived their dog in a more social role, communicated more with their dog and reported more social support from their dog. The study results showed that dog owners anthropomorphize their dog more than the cat owners (indicated by a higher attribution of mental abilities and seeing the pet more often in a human-like social role).

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Conclusion

The researchers stated that although some degree of anthropomorphism might be necessary to experience a connection with an animal, pet caretakers/owners need to keep in mind that cats and dogs are not small humans; they are different species with their own species-specific needs. They further argue that the effects of wrongly projecting human abilities to animals may negatively influence a sustainable, and for both sides beneficial, relationship between humans and animals. Understanding how anthropomorphization influences human perceptions of animals is essential in understanding the human–animal relationship.” (source)

Journal reference: Bouma EMC, Dijkstra A, Arnt Rosa S. Owner’s Anthropomorphic Perceptions of Cats’ and Dogs’ Abilities Are Related to the Social Role of Pets, Owners’ Relationship Behaviors, and Social Support. Animals. 2023; 13(23):3644. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani13233644