Our reasons for loving animals is not based just on empathy, however. The truth is, animals — particularly our pets — offer humans a variety of powerful benefits.
If we analyze our feelings carefully, we often find that most of our adoration of animals centers on dogs and cats. Additionally, we sometimes might feel empathy for large, charismatic wild animals such as elephants, dolphins, or lions. When we read about a lion or an elephant who is hunted and killed in the wild, our response is often one of anger — almost as much anger as hearing stories of abuse and neglect of dogs and cats.
But there is a basic irony about these feelings; the routine slaughter of animals for food (cattle, chickens, pigs, etc.) doesn’t tend to faze most of us nearly as much. There are several psychological explanations as to why that might be.
First, we must account for the influence of pop culture. Take a moment to think about how many pet movies you likely watched as a kid. Many of these media portrayals endow dogs and cats with human qualities. They sometimes talk to each other using verbal language as people would, indulge in dreams for the future, and fall in love just like we do. Popular culture has drilled it into us over generations that our pets are just like humans, and primed many of us to be animal lovers from a young age.
Our reverence for dogs and cats over other species could also be explained by something called “the collapse of compassion.” This is the psychological principle which tells us that the more tragedy we see, the less we care. It’s the answer to why you may not feel any compassion for the millions of people living in extreme poverty, while the story of one child living on the street with no medical care is more likely to move you to want to help.
