Psychology Says People Who Talk to Their Pets in Full Sentences All Day Are Not Necessarily Lonely or Strange

“What did you do while I was away?” “Now we’re going out.” “I told you not to climb up there.” For many people, speaking to a dog or cat in complete sentences is part of everyday life. Some describe what they are doing even though the animal will never answer in words.

The behavior may look like a one-sided conversation, but psychology and animal behavior research point to several processes behind it. Humans tend to attribute mental qualities to other beings, while pets can respond to words, looks, gestures and tone of voice. Talking to an animal, however, does not show that someone is lonely or lacks human relationships.

One useful concept is anthropomorphism, the attribution of human characteristics, intentions or emotions to nonhuman agents. In 2008, Nicholas Epley, Scott Akalis, Adam Waytz and John Cacioppo published experiments in Psychological Science examining why people anthropomorphize. Their findings identified several factors that can encourage the phenomenon, including the need to establish social connections.

That may help explain why an animal can become an interlocutor, but it does not mean that everyone who talks to a pet does so because they feel alone. In one experiment, people with higher levels of chronic loneliness tended to attribute more human characteristics to their pets. In another, researchers experimentally changed participants’ sense of social connection and observed corresponding changes in their tendency to anthropomorphize nonhuman agents.

The research did not specifically examine people who talk to their pets all day, so the behavior cannot serve as an indicator of loneliness. Animals are also not completely passive conversation partners. Dogs may look at their owners, approach them, wag their tails, move their ears or go toward a door after hearing certain words. A study by Paolo Mongillo and colleagues involving 60 dog-owner pairs found that dogs paid different levels of visual attention to their owners and unfamiliar people, looking at their owners for longer. That sensitivity can create a genuine interaction even without a shared spoken language.