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Understanding the impact of dog ownership on autistic adults: implications for mental health and suicide prevention
Mental health problems and suicide are more frequent in autistic adults than general population. Dog ownership can improve human well-being. This study aimed to generate a framework of well-being outcomes for dog-related activities in autistic adults and compare it to the framework generated for a g...
Autores principales: | , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Nature Publishing Group UK
2021
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8655007/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34880277 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-02504-8 |
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author | Barcelos, Ana Maria Kargas, Niko Packham, Chris Mills, Daniel S. |
author_facet | Barcelos, Ana Maria Kargas, Niko Packham, Chris Mills, Daniel S. |
author_sort | Barcelos, Ana Maria |
collection | PubMed |
description | Mental health problems and suicide are more frequent in autistic adults than general population. Dog ownership can improve human well-being. This study aimed to generate a framework of well-being outcomes for dog-related activities in autistic adults and compare it to the framework generated for a general adult population. Thirty-six autistic dog owners (18–74 years old, 18 males) from diverse UK regions were interviewed and transcripts thematically analysed. 16.7% reported that their dogs prevented them from taking their own lives, mainly due to the dog's affection and the need to care for the animal. Close dog-owner interactions (e.g., cuddling, walking, dog's presence) were the most frequent activities improving emotions/moods and life functioning, whereas routine-like activities (e.g., feeding the animal) particularly enhanced life functioning. Well-being worsening was mainly linked to dog behaviour problems, dog poor health/death and obligations to the dog. Despite some negatives associated with ownership, having a dog could improve the well-being of many autistic adults and assist suicide prevention strategies in this high-risk group. The framework was consistent with that generated previously, indicating its robustness and the potential opportunity to focus on dog-related activities rather than the vague concept of “ownership” when considering the impact of ownership on well-being. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-8655007 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2021 |
publisher | Nature Publishing Group UK |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-86550072021-12-09 Understanding the impact of dog ownership on autistic adults: implications for mental health and suicide prevention Barcelos, Ana Maria Kargas, Niko Packham, Chris Mills, Daniel S. Sci Rep Article Mental health problems and suicide are more frequent in autistic adults than general population. Dog ownership can improve human well-being. This study aimed to generate a framework of well-being outcomes for dog-related activities in autistic adults and compare it to the framework generated for a general adult population. Thirty-six autistic dog owners (18–74 years old, 18 males) from diverse UK regions were interviewed and transcripts thematically analysed. 16.7% reported that their dogs prevented them from taking their own lives, mainly due to the dog's affection and the need to care for the animal. Close dog-owner interactions (e.g., cuddling, walking, dog's presence) were the most frequent activities improving emotions/moods and life functioning, whereas routine-like activities (e.g., feeding the animal) particularly enhanced life functioning. Well-being worsening was mainly linked to dog behaviour problems, dog poor health/death and obligations to the dog. Despite some negatives associated with ownership, having a dog could improve the well-being of many autistic adults and assist suicide prevention strategies in this high-risk group. The framework was consistent with that generated previously, indicating its robustness and the potential opportunity to focus on dog-related activities rather than the vague concept of “ownership” when considering the impact of ownership on well-being. Nature Publishing Group UK 2021-12-08 /pmc/articles/PMC8655007/ /pubmed/34880277 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-02504-8 Text en © The Author(s) 2021, corrected publication 2021 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) . |
spellingShingle | Article Barcelos, Ana Maria Kargas, Niko Packham, Chris Mills, Daniel S. Understanding the impact of dog ownership on autistic adults: implications for mental health and suicide prevention |
title | Understanding the impact of dog ownership on autistic adults: implications for mental health and suicide prevention |
title_full | Understanding the impact of dog ownership on autistic adults: implications for mental health and suicide prevention |
title_fullStr | Understanding the impact of dog ownership on autistic adults: implications for mental health and suicide prevention |
title_full_unstemmed | Understanding the impact of dog ownership on autistic adults: implications for mental health and suicide prevention |
title_short | Understanding the impact of dog ownership on autistic adults: implications for mental health and suicide prevention |
title_sort | understanding the impact of dog ownership on autistic adults: implications for mental health and suicide prevention |
topic | Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8655007/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34880277 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-02504-8 |
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