February 26, 2026, 4:58 am | Read time: 5 minutes

Do Pets Make You Happy?

In Germany, nearly every second household has a pet, with cats and dogs primarily populating German living rooms. Organizations and media often convey the impression that animals make people happier and healthier. However, research literature presents contradictory results: Some studies report positive correlations between pet ownership and well-being, while others show negative or no effects.

A central problem in previous research is the methodology. Many studies rely on cross-sectional data—comparing pet owners with non-owners at a single point in time. This approach doesn’t clarify whether the pet improves well-being or if happier and healthier people are more likely to get a pet. Additionally, many studies are based on small or non-representative samples.

A Unique Research Approach

An Australian study aimed to fill this gap by using a political reform as an external change. This was based on a 2020 legislative amendment in the state of Victoria. At that time, tenants were legally allowed to keep pets unless landlords could provide a valid reason to refuse. This reform led to a significant increase in pet ownership among tenants in Victoria.

The hypothesis: If pets truly enhance well-being, this should be evident among those tenants who could acquire a pet for the first time due to the new legislation. Researchers analyzed data from the “Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia” study (HILDA) from 2018 to 2022 and applied a special quasi-experimental method to test whether acquiring a pet actually makes people happier.

What Was Studied–and How?

The data source was the HILDA study, a representative household survey conducted annually since 2001 with around 7,500 households. The study focused on individuals who did not have a pet in 2018 and were renting in Victoria in 2020—a total of 495 households. This analysis concentrated on the group directly affected by the legislative change. Thirty-nine percent of this group acquired a pet by 2022.

Four target variables were recorded:

• Loneliness (scale 1–7),
• Life satisfaction (0–10),
• Mental health (MHI-5, scale 0–100),
• General health (SF-36 subscale, 0–100).

Higher values indicated more loneliness, better health, or higher satisfaction, respectively.

Instead of classic comparison methods, the authors used the so-called SCQE approach. This method makes transparent which assumptions about background trends would be necessary to statistically prove a positive or negative effect of pet ownership.¹

Pets Don’t Make You Happier or Healthier Than Before

The researchers found no convincing evidence that a pet makes people measurably happier, healthier, or less lonely.

• For loneliness, one could only say a pet truly helps if loneliness had increased significantly without a pet. In reality, it only rose slightly. The differences were so small that they could have occurred by chance.
• For life satisfaction, there was practically no change, neither for better nor worse. People with a new pet were, on average, no more satisfied than comparable people without a pet.
• For general health and mental health, the situation was similar: The values changed only minimally. These small differences were so slight that it’s uncertain whether the pet played any role at all.

To have clearly identified a positive effect, the values without a pet would have had to deteriorate much more than was actually observed—two to almost ten times as much. This is considered unrealistic.

In this study, a new pet on average brought neither a measurable boost in happiness nor in health nor a reduction in loneliness.

Positive and Burdensome Aspects of Pets Could Balance Each Other Out

In summary, the results argue against the idea that acquiring a pet on average brings measurable improvements in loneliness, life satisfaction, or health.

This contradicts the widespread assumption that pets generally have a positive effect on mental and physical health. The authors argue that earlier positive findings may be due to selection effects: People who acquire a pet may already systematically differ from those who do not.

Moreover, positive and burdensome aspects of pet ownership could balance each other out. Time commitment, costs, and responsibility could offset potential emotional benefits. It’s also conceivable that positive effects only occur in the short term and level out over time.

More on the topic

Hungarian Long-Term Study Pandemic Pets Didn’t Keep Their Owners Happy for Long

Study Examines Quality of Life Is Your Cat Happy? Why Owners Often Get It Wrong

Study Only Applies to Australia

The study provides one of the most methodologically rigorous tests to date on whether pets causally improve well-being. Nevertheless, there are limitations: Pet ownership was only recorded in 2018 and 2022. The exact timing of acquisition is therefore unknown, as is the duration of pet ownership. Short-term effects could have been blurred as a result. Additionally, pet ownership was measured at the household level—it’s unclear who in the household actually interacted intensively with the pet.

Finally, the study refers to a specific political context in Australia. The transferability to other countries or conditions remains open.

Conclusion: Researchers Find No Evidence That Pets Make You Happier

The Australian analysis finds no evidence that acquiring a pet on average reduces loneliness or improves life satisfaction, mental, and general health. To statistically prove positive effects, unrealistically strong background trends would have been necessary.

This doesn’t mean that individual people don’t benefit significantly from their pets. But as a general strategy for enhancing well-being, acquiring a pet—at least in this context—doesn’t seem to have measurable average effects. For pet lovers, the motivation remains primarily emotional, not health policy-related.