The war between cats and dogs has waged for centuries. Individuals are split into dog or cat type people and I've even witnessed a friend swipe left on Tinder because they found out that their potential match liked cats.
While the majority of the conversation about cats and dogs is purely subjective, it appears that science if definitely favouring the canines of the worlds.
Rebecca A. Johnson, from the University of Missouri College of Veterinary Medicine, reckons that dogs are good at getting their owners up and moving.
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Rebecca told the New York Post: "You need to walk, and so does your dog. It's good for both ends of the leash."
Another study from Missouri found that nearly half of dog walkers were averaging at least 30 minutes of exercise per day. It also reported that dog walkers were more likely to engage in other forms of activity like sports or gardening.
Sure, there are those out there who will walk their cat, but those people are few and far between.
Dogs have also been shown to be able to read human emotions better.
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Dr Kun Guo, from the University of Lincoln's School of Psychology told Reuters: "This is the first empirical experiment that will show dogs can integrate visual and oratory inputs to understand or differentiate human emotion as dog emotion.
"What we found is that when dogs were hearing positive sounds they would look longer to positive faces, both human and dog. And when they were listening to negative sounds they would look longer to negative, angry faces."
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But dogs aren't completely infallible.
They appear to account for more falls in the elderly or frail. A study released by the CDC in America, found nearly 88 percent of falls caused by an animal was caused a dog. That's pretty damning. Another study also found that cats were effective at lowering its owner's bloody pressure.
But whichever pet you prefer, luckily, there is research suggesting that having either is beneficial to your health.
A comprehensive review in the US National Library of Medicine found that pets help humans in four ways: as builders of social capital, as agents of harm reduction, as motivators for healthy behaviour change, and as potential participants in treatment plans.
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Marcia Darling, who was a co-author of that study, told Tonic: "There isn't a definitive study about how this works, but the best theory out there is that because of owners' attachment to the pets, assuming there's a good relationship, even something like the [pet] looking at them can elevate their oxytocin levels."
So if you need some cheering up, provided you have the finances and ability to house a pet, get one.
Featured Image Credit: PA