Happy or healthy? How members of the public prioritise farm animal health and natural behaviours

The importance given to minimising health issues and promoting natural behaviours is a polarising issue within farm animal welfare. It is predominantly thought that members of the public prioritise animals being able to behave naturally over other aspects of farm animal welfare, such as addressing h...

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Autores principales: Vigors, Belinda, Ewing, David A., Lawrence, Alistair B.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7928445/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33657189
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0247788
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author Vigors, Belinda
Ewing, David A.
Lawrence, Alistair B.
author_facet Vigors, Belinda
Ewing, David A.
Lawrence, Alistair B.
author_sort Vigors, Belinda
collection PubMed
description The importance given to minimising health issues and promoting natural behaviours is a polarising issue within farm animal welfare. It is predominantly thought that members of the public prioritise animals being able to behave naturally over other aspects of farm animal welfare, such as addressing health issues. However, public perspectives may be more multi-dimensional than is generally thought, with the importance given to these different elements of welfare dependent on the situation and state of the animals in question. To examine this, a factorial survey using vignettes, which experimentally manipulated the different levels of health (high health vs. low health) and natural behaviour provision (high behaviour vs. low behaviour), was completed by a sample (n = 810) representative of the UK population (on age, gender, ethnicity). Contrary to the predominant view, this study found animal health had the greatest effect on participants’ judgements, explaining more of the variance in their assessments of animal welfare than any other factor. However, findings also indicated that participants considered animal welfare to be most positive when both health issues are minimised and natural behaviours are promoted. Attitudes to natural behaviours also varied more between participants, with females, individuals who do not (regularly) eat meat and those with a greater belief in animal mind giving greater priority to natural behaviours. In the context of public and private welfare standards seeking to meet public expectations, this study provides important insights into how public perspectives of animal welfare are more nuanced than previously thought, influenced by the context of the animal, the aspect of welfare in question and personal characteristics.
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spelling pubmed-79284452021-03-10 Happy or healthy? How members of the public prioritise farm animal health and natural behaviours Vigors, Belinda Ewing, David A. Lawrence, Alistair B. PLoS One Research Article The importance given to minimising health issues and promoting natural behaviours is a polarising issue within farm animal welfare. It is predominantly thought that members of the public prioritise animals being able to behave naturally over other aspects of farm animal welfare, such as addressing health issues. However, public perspectives may be more multi-dimensional than is generally thought, with the importance given to these different elements of welfare dependent on the situation and state of the animals in question. To examine this, a factorial survey using vignettes, which experimentally manipulated the different levels of health (high health vs. low health) and natural behaviour provision (high behaviour vs. low behaviour), was completed by a sample (n = 810) representative of the UK population (on age, gender, ethnicity). Contrary to the predominant view, this study found animal health had the greatest effect on participants’ judgements, explaining more of the variance in their assessments of animal welfare than any other factor. However, findings also indicated that participants considered animal welfare to be most positive when both health issues are minimised and natural behaviours are promoted. Attitudes to natural behaviours also varied more between participants, with females, individuals who do not (regularly) eat meat and those with a greater belief in animal mind giving greater priority to natural behaviours. In the context of public and private welfare standards seeking to meet public expectations, this study provides important insights into how public perspectives of animal welfare are more nuanced than previously thought, influenced by the context of the animal, the aspect of welfare in question and personal characteristics. Public Library of Science 2021-03-03 /pmc/articles/PMC7928445/ /pubmed/33657189 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0247788 Text en © 2021 Vigors et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Vigors, Belinda
Ewing, David A.
Lawrence, Alistair B.
Happy or healthy? How members of the public prioritise farm animal health and natural behaviours
title Happy or healthy? How members of the public prioritise farm animal health and natural behaviours
title_full Happy or healthy? How members of the public prioritise farm animal health and natural behaviours
title_fullStr Happy or healthy? How members of the public prioritise farm animal health and natural behaviours
title_full_unstemmed Happy or healthy? How members of the public prioritise farm animal health and natural behaviours
title_short Happy or healthy? How members of the public prioritise farm animal health and natural behaviours
title_sort happy or healthy? how members of the public prioritise farm animal health and natural behaviours
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7928445/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33657189
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0247788
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