Paws, Trends, and Family Bonds: The Dog Keeping Cultural Runaway Theory

The number of dogs in the USA and other Western countries has increased in the last two decades, while the number of children has remained stable or decreased. One out of ten dog owners agrees that their pet is more important to them than any human. The Dog Keeping Cultural Runaway Theory suggests that given the scarcity of available kin due to demographic factors such as fertility decline, people's strong innate preference for social proximity, nurturing, and the need for “unconditional love” has shifted to pets. The cultural reinforcement of dog ownership has accelerated this trend in the absence of economic and biological constraints. The concept draws inspiration from the Fisherian Biological Runaway Model, which was originally developed to explain how certain detrimental traits, such as the peacock’s long tail, can become more prevalent in a population. When a trait, in this case, regarding dogs as family member, is not evidently biologically adaptive, the concept of cultural runaway processes can help uncover the underlying mechanisms. The purpose of this discussion is to examine the potential impact of current dog keeping on individuals and societies, all while acknowledging the positive bonds between many humans and their animal companions. The review also explores whether dogs facilitate or worsen humans’ network complexity, how cultures differ in dog keeping practices, why women are more closely associated with dogs than men, and how selection for infant-like traits and treating dogs as surrogate children can lead to welfare problems.