In August 2026, the University of Arizona introduced the AURAL-Pet system — the first scientifically grounded method for analyzing how people talk to their pets in everyday life. It is a joint development of Dr. Emily Bray from the College of Veterinary Medicine, graduate student Dara Jonkoski from the Department of Psychology, and Professor Matthias Mehl, who also developed the underlying mobile recording app for the research.
The system is a checklist of interaction categories: praise, questions, commands, expressions of frustration, use of nicknames, and other forms of animal-directed speech. The researchers used the EAR (Electronically Activated Recorder) app — a tool that activates audio recording at random moments during the day, allowing authentic, unstaged samples of everyday behavior. The team analyzed 5072 audio clips from 240 participants of different ages and genders. The results were unexpected: about one tenth of all owners' speaking time is devoted to communicating with pets, and the style of conversation remains deeply individual. For example, some owners constantly use pet nicknames, while others never do.
The reliability of the AURAL-Pet method has been confirmed by rigorous testing: two independent coders consistently rated 22 out of 23 variables. This allows objective recording of real behavior rather than relying on subjective owner reports. The system can capture moments of genuine closeness — when a pet becomes a conversational partner after a hard day at work or a catalyst for communication with other people. As Dr. Bray noted, a pet can either substitute for a social partner or act as a social catalyst, initiating interaction between the owner and other people.
The researchers are already applying AURAL-Pet in the C.A.R.E. project, where they study the mental health and well-being of people over 60 years old. This opens a new perspective for understanding questions that have long interested science: why in some owners pets noticeably reduce loneliness and depression, while in others the effect is minimal or absent. The researchers suggest that differences in the manner of communicating with animals may explain this mystery, revealing individual interaction characteristics that affect well-being.
The publication in the journal Frontiers in Psychiatry is a first step toward a more objective study of owner-pet relationships. Now scientists can directly link specific conversation patterns to mental health indicators, bypassing the subjectivity of questionnaires. As Dr. Bray emphasized, the ability to obtain direct data on real human behavior is exactly what researchers of human behavior need. The system is already openly available to other researchers, which could give impetus to new projects in psychiatry, psychology, gerontology, and the science of human-animal relationships in general.
