The role of pet attachment in alleviating the negative effects of loneliness on a health‐promoting lifestyle: An empirical study based on threshold effects for pet owners

Abstract

BackgroundA health‐promoting lifestyle is acknowledged as a ‘positive ageing’ strategy for older people. The inevitable decline in their social networks may lead to loneliness and subsequently damage their health‐promoting lifestyle. Therefore, pet owning has become a popular way for them to alleviate loneliness. However, the attachment resulting from pet ownership may either facilitate or impede older people's ability to counteract the negative effect of loneliness on health‐promoting lifestyles, and this effect may only be observed when pet owners have limited human confidants.ObjectivesTo identify the role of pet attachment in alleviating the negative impact of loneliness on a health‐promoting lifestyle and its supplementary role in the deficiency of social relationships by analysing the correlation mechanism between pet attachment, loneliness and a health‐promoting lifestyle.MethodsSelf‐report questionnaires were sent to 879 older people (aged ≥60) with pets in China by using a multistage stratified random sampling method. Cross‐sectional threshold regression models were established to analyse the nonlinear effects of loneliness on a health‐promoting lifestyle and the different threshold effects among different social relationship levels.ResultsA single threshold value (0.444) was drawn to determine the action mode of pet attachment on the negative relationship between loneliness and a health‐promoting lifestyle. When the level of pet attachment exceeded 0.444, the inhibition of loneliness on a health‐promoting lifestyle decreased significantly. Additionally, this threshold effect was evident among older people at different levels of social relationships.ConclusionsThe negative effect of loneliness on a health‐promoting lifestyle is alleviated by the single threshold effect of pet attachment. Pet–owner relationships can compensate for a lack of social relationships to some extent and alleviate both an individual's loneliness and its negative effect on a health‐promoting lifestyle.Implications for practiceTo alleviate loneliness and promote healthy ageing in older people who lack social relationships, the tailored pet intervention strategies that prioritize ‘one health’ at the animal‐ecosystem interface that consider their different individual levels of social relationship should be developed.

Relationship between Climate-Shaped Urbanization and Forest Ecological Function: A Case Study of the Yellow River Basin, China

“…When "Pre" was used as the threshold variable, the estimated value for a single threshold was 532.342 mm, with a 95% confidence interval of [413.342, 559.629]. The estimated values for the second threshold (694.178 mm) and the third threshold (285.953 mm) were both outside of this interval, indicating significant differences between the second and third threshold values compared to the first single threshold value [29]. However, by examining the results of the LR test in Figure 6, the LR values were consistently below the critical threshold (Figure 6d), suggesting that the confidence interval for the third threshold is excessively wide and cannot effectively contribute to the threshold convergence.…”

“…It takes the value 1 when the threshold variable is within that interval; otherwise, it takes 0. λ is the estimated threshold value, β is the coefficient estimated using the nonlinear least square method, k is the number of thresholds, γ is the coefficient of each control variable, and ε is the random disturbance term in the model. The testing of the threshold model primarily consists of two parts [27][28][29]. First is the F-test for the existence of threshold effects, that is, the significance test of threshold effects, with the null hypothesis H 0 :…”