The Link Between Consumer Behaviors And Beliefs About Animal Emotions

How are people’s beliefs about animal emotions related to their decisions to avoid animal products and activities that use or exploit animals? That’s the question this study aimed to answer in two surveys of 594 total U.S. adults, recruited from an online research participant database.

For both surveys, respondents completed the following:

• The Beliefs about Animal Emotions Scale: This asked people about their views on how complex and authentic animal emotions are, whether animals’ emotions depend on their similarity to humans, and how much animal emotions matter ethically. They rated statements like “An animal’s emotions are basically just simple reactions to threats or rewards” and “Animals’ emotional states matter less than human emotions” on a seven-point scale from “strongly agree” to “strongly disagree.”
• An adapted Dietarian Identity Questionnaire: This asked people about six different categories of animal products, including beef, pork, chicken, fish, milk, and eggs. For each one, people answered whether they generally avoid eating that particular product.
• An Animal Use Avoidance Index: This asked people about six different categories of animal-related activities and non-food products. For each one, people answered whether they generally avoid that particular non-dietary behavior. For instance, statements included “I generally avoid places that keep wild animals for exhibition (zoos, marine parks, etc.)” and “I generally avoid clothing with animal products (leather, fur, etc.).”

Respondents were also asked where their beliefs about animal emotions came from, such as direct experience with animals, social media, or documentary movies. Finally, the study collected demographic information to see whether these factors helped explain respondents’ consumer behaviors.

How Many People Avoid Animal Use?

In the first survey, close to two-thirds (63%) of respondents reported avoiding none of the animal products. Just 1.5% said they avoided all six. Due to this imbalance, the second survey specifically targeted self-identified vegans and vegetarians for recruitment. Nearly a third (31%) of respondents in the second survey reported avoiding none of the animal products, and 17% said they avoided all six.

Over two-thirds (68.5%) of respondents in the first survey avoided at least one non-dietary behavior. In the second survey, this increased to more than three-quarters (78%). Of the non-dietary behaviors listed, avoiding products that were tested on animals was the most common response in the first survey (36%), and avoiding killing pest animals like mice was the most common response in the second survey (50%).

Are Beliefs About Animal Emotions Linked To Consumer Behaviors?

A statistical model found that demographic factors like age, gender, and education were predictive of people’s avoidance behaviors, though the pattern wasn’t identical across surveys. In the first survey, women and older people were more likely to avoid non-dietary behaviors, while those with more education were less likely to. In the second survey, older people reported more dietary avoidances, and people with more education reported fewer avoidances of both types.

However, respondents’ scores on the animal emotions scale predicted their consumer behaviors above and beyond these demographic factors. That is, knowing someone’s beliefs about animal emotions tells you more about their likely behavior than just their age, gender, or level of education. Specifically, the more strongly people saw animal emotions as complex and authentic, the more avoidances they reported — both food-related and non-food-related.

Where Do These Beliefs Come From?

When it came to different sources of beliefs about animal emotions, by far the most common answer was by directly observing their own companion animals. Around half (50%) of respondents reported this as an influence in the first survey. The second most common answer was documentaries or television, with around 21% of respondents reporting this as an influence in the first survey.

When these sources were rated on a three-point scale from “not at all” to “a lot” in the second survey, companion animals were rated as the greatest influence. This in turn was linked to stronger beliefs in the complexity and authenticity of animal emotions and in the moral relevance of animal emotions.

Limitations And Takeaways

The biggest limitation of this study is that it can’t establish cause and effect. It may be that people who attribute more emotions to animals are motivated to avoid more animal products, or it could be that people who consume more animal products are motivated to attribute fewer emotions to animals due to cognitive dissonance.

Still, the study’s results raise some useful considerations for advocates. First, they align with previous findings that women tend to have more pro-animal attitudes than men. Second, they suggest that people with more formal education tend to have less pro-animal attitudes. Advocacy campaigns that target these different groups may therefore need to adopt different strategies.