An estimated ** million households in the United States owned at least one dog according to a 2024/25 pet owners survey, making them the most widely owned type of pet across the U.S. at this time. Cats and freshwater fish ranked in second and third places, with around ** million and ** million households owning such pets, respectively. Freshwater vs. salt water fish Freshwater fish spend most or all their lives in fresh water. Fresh water’s main difference to salt water is the level of salinity. Freshwater fish have a range of physiological adaptations to enable them to live in such conditions. As the statistic makes clear, Americans keep a large number of freshwater aquatic species at home as pets. American pet owners In 2023, around ** percent of all households in the United States owned a pet. This is a decrease from 2020, but still around a ** percent increase from 1988. It is no surprise that as more and more households own pets, pet industry expenditure has also witnessed steady growth. Expenditure reached over *** billion U.S. dollars in 2022, almost a sixfold increase from 1998. The majority of pet product sales are still made in brick-and-mortar stores, despite the rise and evolution of e-commerce in the United States.

Dataset used in the article "Does Visual Stimulation by Photographs of Cats and Dogs Make People Happier and More Optimistic?"ColumnsIDis_preview: true - response by the researcher to check the questionnaire, it should be removedremove: respondent checked that his/her responses are not valid and should not be used in future analysisfinished_proc: percentage of the questionnaire finisheddate_time: filing of the questionnaire started at this timeduration_formatted: duration of the filling of the questionnairebrowserbrowser_versionOS: operating systempriming: true - primed group, false - control groupcat_dog: objects on photos showngenderage: in yerssex_o: attraction to people of the opposite sex (scale 1 - 7)sex_s: attraction to people of the same sex (scale 1 - 7) orientation: computed as the difference of previous twomood: actual mood (scale 0 - 5)condition_phys: physical condition (scale 0 - 5)condition_psych: mental condition (scale 0 - 5)life_quality: life quality (scale 0 - 5)optimism: mean of previous threeoptimism_zskore: z-score of the previous children_own: how many children does respondent havewanted_sons: total number of sons which respondent would like to havewanted_daughters: total number of daughters which respondent would like to havewanted_children: a sum of previous twoliking_dogs: how much respondent likes dogs (scale 1 - 100)present_whenever_dog: respondent has ever kept a dogpresent_now_dog: respondent keeps dog nowpresent_Ndogs: how many dogs does respondent keep now liking_cats: how much respondent likes cats (scale 1 - 100)present_whenever_cat: respondent has ever kept a catpresent_now_cat: respondent keeps cat nowpresent_Ncats: how many cats does respondent keep now

Over the past decade, Lyme and other tick-borne diseases have expanded into urban areas, including Staten Island, New York. While Lyme disease is often researched with a focus on human risk, domestic pets are also at risk of contracting the disease. The present study aims to describe differences in tick exposure, knowledge, attitude, and practices (KAP) between pet owners and non-owners, and to understand preventive strategies practiced by pet owners for themselves and their pets. We conducted KAP surveys via phone in 2020 and via face-to-face interviews in 2021, and we analyzed unique responses from 364 households on Staten Island. Pet owners were more likely to have ever found a tick on themselves or their household members (63%) than non-owners (46%) (p