Research shows that dogs make our lives better

Here's a break from the steady flow of negative news.

We know from the pet photos that there a lot of pet lovers here in the AMERICAblog community. For all those dog lovers out there, this story won't come as a complete surprise, but the results are quite astonishing:

New research from the University of Missouri has found that people who walk dogs are more consistent about regular exercise and show more improvement in fitness than people who walk with a human companion. In a 12-week study of 54 older adults at an assisted living home, 35 people were assigned to a walking program for five days a week, while the remaining 19 served as a control group. Among the walkers, 23 selected a friend or spouse to serve as a regular walking partner along a trail laid out near the home. Another 12 participants took a bus daily to a local animal shelter where they were assigned a dog to walk.

To the surprise of the researchers, the dog walkers showed a big improvement in fitness, while the human walkers began making excuses to skip the workout. Walking speed among the dog walkers increased by 28 percent, compared with just a 4 percent increase among the human walkers.

“What happened was nothing short of remarkable,” said Rebecca A. Johnson, a nursing professor and director of the Research Center for Human Animal Interaction at the University of Missouri’s College of Veterinary Medicine.

That's because dogs are remarkable. Read that whole post. It's quite inspiring.

I know a certain AMERICAblog writer who was more than a bit overweight back in early 2000, before he got Boomer, the predecessor to Petey. But, walking Boomer three or four times a day helped start the weight loss. Now, that same writer runs marathons.