A recent Swedish twin study provides evidences of a strong genetic component to dog ownership. The results fit with feelings many have that loving dogs is an intrinsic part of who we are. Heritability for dog ownership ranged from 57 percent for females and 51 percent for males. A shared environment accounted for much less; in the range of 0 to 6 percent.
Source: Bark, May 2019. Link. There are two reasons that the results of this study are important scientifically.
- If there is genetic variation that affects dog ownership, it is possible that genetic variation was an important factor that affected humans’ ability to domesticate dogs and other animals.
- Whenever studies assert that there are health effects related to having a dog, it is important to consider that there may be genes that influence both health and the likelihood of having dogs.