The other day I was looking through works on animal psychology and decided to share with you a very nice topic - animotherapy. Animotherapy (zootherapy, pet therapy) is a method of treating patients with the help of pets . You don’t even have to be a patient to feel how the purring of a cat on your lap relaxes you or how playing with a dog in the yard energizes you. In the process of such interaction between a person and an animal, the emotional state improves and stress decreases. In 2019, an interesting article was published in the medical journal Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality, published by the American Heart Association: dog owners live on average longer than other people, and have a lower risk of cardiovascular diseases (by the way, in Russia, mortality from circulatory diseases is in 1st place!). Thus, dogs give positive emotions to their owners and once again force them to be physically active.🔸 There are many directions in pet therapy: - feline therapy (Latin felis - cat) - canistherapy (Latin canis - dog) - hippotherapy - therapeutic horse riding Principle you understand - we take the Latin or Greek root of the animal and add the word “therapy”. 🔸You won’t believe it, but there is information that llamas (!) have a positive effect on schizophrenics. Do you know what the secret is? When in contact with our smaller brothers, oxytocin and endorphins are produced. The first is the hormone of the hypothalamus, which is especially actively secreted during touching, hugging, and stroking. Oxytocin reduces anxiety, creates a feeling of happiness and comfort. And endorphins are a group of 20 peptide hormones similar in structure that the body uses as a natural pain reliever. They dull discomfort and provide a feeling of well-being by binding to opioid receptors in the peripheral nervous system, which leads to a decrease in pain impulses. In the central nervous system, they stimulate the production of dopamine, a hormone that motivates and gives a feeling of satisfaction. My favorite biochemistry teacher, Alla Lvovna Tsytovich, said: “A happy person recovers faster.” Therefore, animals are used as adjuvant therapy for a variety of diseases. And in everyday life, pets help us fight stress and anxiety. Who has noticed the positive effect of spending time with a pet? Share your feelings! With: