In the UK dogs bring people together; in the US they hold people together.

Dogs in the UK and the US have similar, but different roles. In the UK dogs bring people together; in the US they hold people together.

Dogs in the UK:

Dogs in the UK are typically bought once a family unit has been established. This study of UK dog ownership concluded that dogs are most likely to be owned by families with children in the 6-19 age bracket.  The dogs function? To give parents an excuse to talk to their children: once kids reach a certain age they find it hard to speak to their parents without the conversation serving being transactional. And parents, acutely aware that they are becoming more and more of a commodity every, day buy a dog.

Everyone loves the family dog and the furry friend becomes a mediator between awkward teenagers and weary adults. When the conversation runs dry the family dog can always be relied upon to bundle into the room and roll on the carpet, a distraction from the fact that the family has absolutely nothing to say to one another.

Dogs in the US:

The mean dog-purchase age in the US seems to be much lower and in cities such as Washington DC young men and women, who can’t be over the age of 28, parade up and down the streets each morning poop-a-scooping and patting. When I first came across the dog parks and the poodle parlors I couldn’t understand why anyone so young would want need a dog – after all they have no families that they need to patch together. But then I realized that these young people are using their dogs in a different way: they are using their dogs to hold their ‘sleves’ together.  Or as this study says:

“There has been a notable change in family structure in contemporary American society in which individuals are adopting dogs to fulfill their sense of having a “family.”

In cities like DC the population is so young that family units haven’t been established yet, and the States is so huge that parents aren’t just a 3 hour train journey away like they are in the UK. On top of this the friends you make in a city like DC are like sand, month by month they slip through your hands on their way to the next city or job. And in such a transient city the responsibility that comes with a pooch is what you need to tie you together.