Give a dog a bone: Spending money on pets promotes happiness

Abstract

Pet owners routinely spend money on services, accessories, and gifts for their pets. The present research investigates the affective consequences of pet spending. Specifically, we propose that spending money on pets promotes happiness. As predicted, a lab study demonstrated that pet owners who were randomly assigned to recall a time they spent money on their pet reported greater happiness than those who recalled spending money on themselves. Likewise, a field study demonstrated that pet owners who were randomly assigned to spend $5 on their pet reported greater happiness than those who were assigned to spend on themselves or another person -an effect specific to feelings of happiness rather than to mood more generally. This research offers pet owners an evidence-based strategy for boosting happiness, representing an additional intentional activity that can be used to improve well-being.

The Emotional Rewards of Prosocial Spending Are Robust and Replicable in Large Samples

“…For Miles and Upenieks (2022, Experiment 4), results are shown for the comparison of the prosocial-earning condition with the control condition (no earning). For White et al (2022, Experiment 1), results are shown for the comparison of the personal-spending condition with the prosocial-spending condition.…”

“…Although all of the smaller experiments reviewed above examined actual financial behavior in the moment, one additional study used a recollection paradigm in which participants were asked to recall a time when they spent money on themselves, another person, or a pet (White et al, 2022, Experiment 1). Although participants felt happier after recalling spending money on a pet rather than on themselves, they did not feel significantly happier after recalling spending money on another person rather than on themselves.…”

Can HRV Training Make Us Happy: An Experimental Study on University Students

“…There are many ways to promote happiness of individuals. For example, caring for others, spending money for pets or other people promotes happiness (White et al, 2022). Another study claims that rather than oneself, happiness comes from trying to make others feel good (Titova & Sheldon, 2022).…”

How Can People Become Happier? A Systematic Review of Preregistered Experiments

“…While Curry et al (2018) examined a wide range of experimental manipulations involving kindness or generosity, most of the pre-registered experiments in this area have focused specifically on "prosocial spending": using money to benefit others. Aknin et al (2022) recently reviewed all 15 published, pre-registered experiments on prosocial spending, and thus we provide a relatively brief overview of these studies here (Aknin et al, 2020;Hannibal et al, 2019;Martela & Ryan, 2021;Miles & Upenieks, 2022;O'Brien & Kassirer, 2019;White et al, 2022). Of these 15 experiments, seven included fairly large samples, with at least 200 participants per condition.…”