{"id":40807,"date":"2026-10-07T03:19:42","date_gmt":"2026-10-07T08:19:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/?p=40807"},"modified":"2026-10-07T03:19:42","modified_gmt":"2026-10-07T08:19:42","slug":"briefly-study-suggests-that-living-with-cats-good-for-mental-health","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/?p=40807","title":{"rendered":"Briefly: Study suggests that living with cats good for mental health"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Oliver-in-office-window-Oct.-6-2026.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-40812\" src=\"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Oliver-in-office-window-Oct.-6-2026.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"920\" height=\"518\" srcset=\"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Oliver-in-office-window-Oct.-6-2026.jpg 920w, https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Oliver-in-office-window-Oct.-6-2026-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Oliver-in-office-window-Oct.-6-2026-768x432.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 920px) 100vw, 920px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s another reason to appreciate the cats in your life: <a href=\"https:\/\/journals.plos.org\/plosone\/article?id=10.1371\/journal.pone.0357911\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">New research<\/a> involving 93 countries found that places with more cats per person also tended to have happier people. The researchers say the finding fits with previous evidence that living with pets can reduce loneliness and stress while providing companionship, emotional attachment and social support. The study doesn\u2019t prove that cats cause greater happiness, but it certainly adds to the evidence that sharing your home \u2014 and your life \u2014 with a cat might be good for you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Here\u2019s another reason to appreciate the cats in your life: New research involving 93 countries found that places with more cats per person also tended to have happier people. The researchers say the finding fits with previous evidence that living with pets can reduce loneliness and stress while providing companionship, emotional attachment and social support. <a href=\"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/?p=40807\" class=\"more-link\">Keep Reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[556],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40807","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-briefly","entry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1x9iR-aCb","jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40807","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40807"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40807\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40813,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40807\/revisions\/40813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40807"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40807"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40807"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}