March 2011
Featured in this insight: Media & publishing, Public health & wellbeing
Survey finds Brits prefer pets over partners: A recent survey commissioned to coincide with the DVD release of the movie Marmaduke has discovered that many Britons rank their pets higher than their love lives.
The researchers interviewed 3,000 pet owners about how having a pet impacted on their relationships. They found that nearly one in five said they would prefer to have a pet dog than a relationship. In total, more than a quarter of dog owners and a third of cat owners would rather have a pet than a child.
A further 81% of those who owned dogs said that they would not date anybody who didn’t get on with their pet. In contrast, 57% of cat owners would not put up with bad relations between their feline and their partner.
The study also showed that owning a pet could be a source of animosity between couples; as 11% felt jealous of the time their partner spent with their pet, 12% felt the animal was having a negative effect on their relationship and 13% suspected their partner loved their pet more than they did them.
When the respondents were quizzed about how tactile they were with their pet as opposed to their partner, 36% said they stroke their pet more than they touch their partner, with the figures particularly high among owners of smaller dog breeds.
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