By Anne Beall, PhD
Trevor, an emergency and critical care veterinarian, was suffering from “compassion fatigue” — which is rampant in caregiving professions. In order to function despite the stress and anxiety of seeing innocent animals suffer and die each day, he had become so detached and cold in his job that he eventually stopped enjoying anything and no longer felt sadness or joy.
His cat, GG, seemed to understand he needed comfort. Already companionable, GG began paying Trevor even more attention, waiting for him to get home, greeting him, snuggling and wanting to go everywhere with him. GG’s presence calmed Trevor and allowed him to remove the armor around his heart, leading him to take some time off from work and seek counseling. Ultimately, he was able to let go of all the pain he’d been holding.
Given that cats have been stereotyped as cold, aloof and self-absorbed — “Dogs have masters and cats have staff,” the saying goes — this seems surprising. But stories like Trevor and GG’s abound. I’ve personally experienced many relationships and encounters with cats that have shown how much comfort they can proactively bring.
Once, walking along Michigan Avenue in Chicago, I stopped to chat with a homeless man sitting on the street with a pet cat. He told me that he struggles with mental illness and that when he has panic attacks, the cat senses his need for help and comes to sit next to him.
In these times in particular, with stress and anxiety running high and so many of us feeling isolated both emotionally and physically, a cat might, in fact, be just the right companion to help us through. And the suggestion is not based just on anecdotes. There are many reasons you should get a cat.
To help me better understand what I’ve observed about cats, my firm surveyed over 1,500 Americans with cats in their lives. We asked them to tell us about their experiences with and perceptions of up to three cats, either currently living with them or from the past. Because each person talked about two to three different cats, we learned how a total of 3,169 cats make or have made people feel. I write about the findings in my new book Heroic, Helpful and Caring Cats: Felines Who Make a Difference.
Here are the four major reasons we uncovered why cats might be the perfect companion if you’re feeling stressed or isolated in these — or any — times:
How cats help with feelings of stress and isolation
Cats love unconditionally
The attention GG gave Trevor showed how much she loved him. But more importantly, GG gave this love and provided Trevor time to heal without any pressure. Likewise, Tommy, an 8-year-old Tabby cat I write about, follows Christy, whom he lives with, everywhere and sleeps next to her at night, constantly providing unconditional positive vibes. This sentiment is one that was echoed throughout the survey responses we received, in which caretakers said that they strongly believe the majority of their cats (65%) love them unconditionally.
Cats help people feel better about themselves and the world
As GG’s story and the story of the homeless man I spoke with demonstrate, cats’ comfort is far more than their soft, fuzzy physical presence: their behavior suggests they are proactively offering help to the people they love. Indeed, among those we surveyed, over half (56%) of their cats had provided comfort to their caretaker when they needed it and 41% of cats helped them when they were having a difficult time emotionally. Other ways we found cats have helped include: helping their caretakers through an illness (19%), or helping them through a death or divorce (16%). More surprisingly, we found that one-third (36%) of these felines made their caretaker feel better about themselves. But the most interesting finding from our perspective was that over half of these cats (54%) made their caretakers feel better about the world just by being in their lives.
Cats provide companionship
In exploring the relationships people have with cats, we discovered that more than three-quarters (77%) of these cat-human relationships are described as “very close.” The degree of closeness appears to be due to the amount of communication that occurs between cats and people. We learned that almost two-thirds (59%) of these relationships contained a great deal of communication between caretaker and cat, and that most cats read the caretaker extremely well and vice versa. This finding mirrors other research that has shown that cats’ attachment styles mirror those of humans (Attachment Research). We also found that cats are far from aloof: cats and people spend a fair amount of time together. Data collected before the pandemic showed that in 38% of cases, cats and caretakers were together 12 or more hours per day, and in 48% of cases they were together for three to eleven hours a day. Perhaps this amount of time and the closeness of the relationship explains why two-thirds (64%) of these cats are regarded as family members.
Cats make people feel happy
We also learned that the majority (72%) of these cats make their caretakers happy. Part of this feeling is certainly due to the degree to which cats love their caretakers and provide companionship, but we found that it’s even more than that. Caretakers enjoy their cat’s personality and regard them as highly intelligent. In fact, two-thirds (65%) of these felines are described as highly intelligent compared to other animals, and one-third (34%) are perceived to be highly intelligent compared to people! Given that this is a highly intelligent, appealing family member who loves them unconditionally, it’s not surprising that cats make people feel happy and add a great deal to their lives.
The bottom line
In a time when people are feeling stressed and lonely, millions of Americans have a cat in their home and know how much of a difference these creatures can make in one’s life. Is now the time for you to join their ranks?
Anne E. Beall, PhD is the CEO and Founder of Beall Research, Inc, a consulting firm that uses data and research to discover trends and create solutions for Fortune 500 companies. Author of Heroic, Helpful & Caring Cats: Felines Who Make a Difference and seven other books on human-animal relations, fairy tales, gender dynamics and market research, Anne previously worked for the Boston Consulting Group (BCG). She received her MS, MPhil, and PhD from Yale University. A lover of cats, storytelling and walking, Anne lives in Chicago.