Reading time: 2 minutes – Spotted on The Conversation
Should you let your pets into the bedroom? According to an article recently published by The Conversation, it seems that the answer is rather negative, especially if it involves a dog. We owe this conclusion to Brian N. Chin, who teaches psychology at Trinity College, an American university based in the state of Connecticut, and whose work on the subject is available on the Scientific Reports website.
To arrive at this assertion, Professor Chin’s team questioned 1,500 American adults about their sleep habits. Since half of them reported sleeping with pets for at least part of the night, the researchers were able to compare the sleep quality of these individuals with that of people who did not sleep with any non-human animals.
The research findings are telling: insomnia and poor sleep are correlated with sleeping with pets. Although the conclusions hardly vary depending on the categories of individuals, they do differ as soon as the type of animal is specified. Brian N. Chin writes in writing that sleeping with dogs has negative consequences on sleep, while there is no evidence that this is also the case for adults who sleep with cats.
Unawareness inconveniences
These results are far from being anecdotal, because moreover, Professor Chin’s team writes that 93% of people who sleep with at least one pet think that the presence of it has either a positive effect on their sleep , or no effect at all. In other words, a significant number of people do not realize that sharing their bed with an animal (especially a dog) alters the quality of their night.
To get the most out of your dog, it is therefore strongly recommended to spend time with him during the day, then take time off when you go to bed. This is sometimes easier said than done, as animals that are insufficiently educated or more emotionally dependent than average cannot tolerate being separated from their human companions for an entire night. Untimely barking or meowing, more frequent mischief: some of them do not hesitate to let it be known.
Please note: at this stage, only a correlation between a dog in the bedroom and poor sleep has been proven. Nothing demonstrates that it is directly the presence of this good grandfather which leads to the degradation of the night of the humans who share space with him. Moreover, the article also specifies that sleeping with another human being also tends to harm the quality of sleep. Finally, we note that owning a pet would have a more positive effect on people in a relationship.
In short, the subject is perhaps not as simple as it seems – but we in any case recommend that those who can acquire a king size mattress and box spring, which cannot make of bad.
