Children with pets likely to be healthier

By Bae Ji-sooks

Pets are good for children, especially dogs. Children who raise pets are more active and possibly healthier than those who don’t according to a research conducted by a group of doctors and scholars at St George's University of London, earlier last week.

Of the 2,065 children aged between nine and 10, children whose families owned dogs had higher levels of physical activity compared to their peers without. The finding was published in the American Journal of Public Health and was quoted by multiple media outlets including the Science Daily.

The team led by Dr. Christopher Owen explained that raising a dog encourages children to be active and helps combat rising childhood obesity, resulting in a healthier lifestyle.

According to the Science Daily, the researchers used activity monitors to record the daily movement levels of the children from 78 schools in London, Birmingham and Leicester over seven days. Of the total participants, 202 (about 10 percent) owned dogs.

The children with dogs spent an average of 325 minutes doing physical activity per day, 11 more than those without dogs, in light, moderate, moderate to vigorous, and vigorous activities. Dog owners also spent 11 minutes less (562 altogether) in sedentary behavior each day. They were found to take 360 more steps (four per cent) than the others.

The Science Daily quoted Owen saying, “The more active lifestyles of children from dog-owning families is really interesting _ is it that owning a dog makes you more active or that more active families choose to have a dog? It's a bit of a chicken and egg question. Long-term studies are needed to answer it, but it may be a bit of both.

Previous studies have compared adult activity levels before and after getting a dog, and found that they do become more active afterwards, the daily said. Adults who own dogs take 1,700 more steps a day on average than non-dog owners _ a 25 percent difference.

But this study is novel in showing that children who have a dog are more active, although long term studies are needed to see if the effect is seen before and after owning a dog, Owen said.

“Further work is needed to determine how much of dog-owning children's physical activity is actually undertaken with their pet. If children really are going for walk-about with their dog, this may be one way to encourage more kids to be active,” he was quoted as saying.