Abstract
The objective of this study was to investigate the animal welfare issues considered the most important by companion animal veterinarians worldwide. For this purpose, a global survey of several potential animal welfare issues was distributed via SurveyMonkey® in multiple languages. The distribution of survey responses differed by region. The main animal welfare concern reported worldwide was obesity, although there were differences across regions, possibly due to cultural and socioeconomic factors. Anthropomorphism (attributing human qualities or characteristics to an animal) was an issue in western countries but less so in Asia, Africa, and Oceania. There were significant differences between Asia and Europe, Africa, and Oceania in the importance and prevalence of convenience euthanasia. There were also age and sex differences in participant responses, with older veterinarians reporting fewer welfare problems than younger veterinarians, and female veterinarians reporting more welfare issues than their male counterparts.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 215-237 |
| Number of pages | 23 |
| Journal | Journal of Applied Animal Welfare Science |
| Volume | 24 |
| Issue number | 3 |
| Early online date | 28 Jan 2020 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 23 Jun 2021 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:The authors acknowledge the financial support of the Animal Welfare Guidelines Group by Waltham®. The authors are also grateful to the two anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments on the manuscript, which has undoubtedly helped the authors to improve the article.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
Keywords
- Animal welfare
- geographic regions
- global
- veterinarians
