Countries with the most cats also have, on average, happier inhabitants. What can we conclude from this?
Researchers compared data from 93 countries. They looked at happiness levels, wealth, healthcare spending and the number of cats relative to the population. They also examined Toxoplasma gondii, a widespread parasite whose natural life cycle includes cats.
Illustrative image - AI-generated
First finding: the more cats a country has, the higher its happiness score tends to be. The link is strong enough to appear in the calculations even when researchers take several other factors into account.
Does this mean that adopting a cat makes people happier? Not so fast. The study compares entire countries, not cat owners with people who do not own cats. It therefore identifies links between national statistics, without being able to say what causes what.
Rich countries, for example, often have more domestic cats and also report higher levels of happiness. Standard of living could therefore explain part of the result. Culture, housing conditions and the importance given to companion animals may also play a role.
The study offers another surprise involving Toxoplasma gondii. Researchers used data on pregnant women, among whom screening is widespread, to estimate the parasite's presence in each country. Where signs of recent infections were more common, which presumably means more contact with cats, happiness levels tended to be... lower.
The paradox is interesting: more cats did not correspond to more infections. The authors suggest one possible explanation. In wealthier countries, cats are more often kept indoors, eat prepared food and receive more veterinary care. They would therefore be less exposed to the parasite and less likely to spread it.
Money is also strongly linked to the result. In this study, wealth per capita is even more closely associated with happiness than the number of cats. In other words, these felines obviously do not replace standard of living, health or the other factors known to accompany well-being.
To find out whether cats themselves really have an effect, people would need to be followed over time, for example before and after an animal arrives in their home. Researchers could then more clearly distinguish the effect of a cat's companionship from that of income, lifestyle or the country where one lives.