Quirkology is carrying out ongoing research into the alleged personality of pets and their owners.

Initial work involved asking over 2000 owners to rate their personality on several factors (e.g., sociability, emotional stability, and sense of humour), make the same ratings for their pets, and indicate how long they had owned their pet.


The results revealed significant similarities between the personality of owners and their pets. Previous studies have revealed that owners often show a physical resemblance to their pets, and this work suggests that they may also think alike. Interestingly, this similarity increased over time, suggesting that pets may slowly come to adopt their owner’s personality, or vice versa.

Large differences also emerged between the personalities of pet owners. Fish owners were the happiest, dog owners the most fun to be with, cat owners the most dependable and emotionally sensitive, and reptile owners the most independent.

For years, owners have insisted that their pets have a unique personality – not only does this work suggest they might be right, but also reveals that people’s pets are a reflection of themselves.

Finally, the work also revealed telling differences when it came to rating pets’ sense of humour, and suggested that 62% of dogs had a good had a sense of humour, compared to just 57% of fish, 48% of cats, 42% of horses, 38% of birds and 0% of reptiles.

The Daily Telegraph reported on these initial findings here, and Good Morning America covered the project here.

If you currently have a pet we would like you to spend a few moments completing our new survey.

Click here to take part in the experiment.

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