Animals as more than just workers: Considering the role of pets as facilitators of nonwork–work processes

In their focal article, Hernandez et al. (2025) detail the merit of taking a more animal inclusive perspective in industrial-organizational psychology (I-O) psychology research, education, and policy decisions.They focus primarily on the role of animals as workers who labor for humans.As illustrated in Table 1 (Hernandez et al., 2025, p. 4), animals occupy various roles within the 21 st century economy, including as therapy animals (i.e., recreational therapists), farm livestock (i.e., farmworkers and laborers), and military and security personnel (i.e., special forces and security guards).Overall, we fully support the authors' argument that an expanded, interspecies view of "who" constitutes a worker-including nonhuman animals-is necessary.Rather than challenging any claims made by Hernandez et al. ( 2025), our objective is to augment their work by discussing additional avenues for human-animal research in the field of I-O psychology that positions animals as not just workers, but as essential members of the family unit in the form of pets 1 that have the potential to both enhance and inhibit desired work outcomes.Pets, like work and workers, are ubiquitous in modern society.Indeed, more than half of the global population is estimated to own a pet (HealthforAnimals, 2022), with over 65.1 million households in the United States alone owning a pet dog (Megna, 2025).The bonds that people form with their pets may help to explain their widespread popularity.Many endorse the "Pet Effect" (Herzog, 2011), or the notion that animal companionship improves the well-being of humans (Janssens et al., 2020).Research indicates that many consider their pets to be integral members of their families (e.g., Coren, 2017;McConnell et al., 2019)-influencing decisions surrounding finances, relocation, family planning, and more (Coren, 2023).These phenomena are not new; animals have lived alongside humans as pet companions for millennia, with members of ancient societies such as the Greeks and Romans keeping birds, cats, dogs, and other animals as pets (e.g., Lazenby, 1949).Despite these long-standing and rich relationships, the role of pets as facilitators of psychological processes for workers has largely been overlooked outside of a handful of articles (e.g., Hughes et al., 2024;Juna-Silva, 2023, 2025).Drawing from the work-home resources model (Ten Brummelhuis & Bakker, 2012), our goal is to advance animal inclusive research in the field of I-O psychology by outlining areas of inquiry that focus on the role of pets within the work-nonwork interface.Specifically, we discuss the potential of and provide ideas for research that emphasizes the role of pets as facilitators of both positive (i.e., enrichment) and negative (i.e., conflict) nonwork-work processes.