Advocating for animals through attempting to change people’s attitudes and behaviors can be challenging. Individual differences such as gender, culture, or even personality could influence how effective a particular kind of advocacy approach is. For example, women might be more empathetic compared to men after learning about the plight of farmed animals. Therefore, having some idea of how different kinds of people might react to advocacy could help advocates adapt and focus their efforts more efficiently.

Currently, there isn’t much research on how different sorts of people respond to animal advocacy. To help fill this gap, a group of researchers in the U.K. investigated whether differences in gender, speciesism, and social dominance orientation affect how likely a person is to change their attitudes and behaviors towards farmed animals. Speciesism is the belief that some species inherently have more moral worth than others, especially regarding non-human animals. Social dominance orientation is a person’s preference for inequality between social groups — someone high in social dominance orientation prefers a hierarchical society, while someone low in social dominance orientation prefers equality between groups.

The researchers thought that women and people low in speciesism and social dominance orientation would be more likely to report more compassionate attitudes towards farmed animals after viewing video footage of animal suffering. To test this, they conducted an online survey with a sample of 495 people, most of whom identified as female (75%) and white (69%).

The survey gathered information on participants’ gender, speciesist beliefs, social dominance orientation, and egg consumption in the previous two weeks. The participants then viewed either footage of poor conditions on a free-range egg farm (the advocacy video) or a lifestyle video about plant-based recipes (the control). Afterwards, they were asked to rate how much they:

• Believed that eating eggs harms chickens and that eating fewer eggs is important;
• Believed that free-range eggs are more ethical than battery-cage eggs;
• Intended to eat fewer eggs; and
• Intended to eat a more plant-based diet.

Overall, participants who watched the advocacy video were more likely to think that eating eggs is harmful to chickens and that free-range eggs aren’t more ethical than eggs from battery-cage farms. They also expressed stronger intentions to eat fewer eggs than participants who watched the lifestyle video.

Female gender was negatively correlated with speciesism, social dominance orientation, and egg consumption, but positively correlated with believing that eating eggs is harmful to chickens, intentions to eat fewer eggs, and intentions to eat more plant-based foods. Social dominance orientation and speciesism were positively correlated with egg consumption and thinking that free-range is more ethical than battery cages. They were negatively correlated with believing that eating eggs is harmful to chickens, intentions to eat fewer eggs, and intentions to eat more plant-based foods.

The researchers’ main question — whether the advocacy video’s effectiveness depended on individual differences between people — yielded a few interesting findings. They found that women who viewed the advocacy video were more likely to have a more compassionate attitude towards chickens (i.e., thinking that it’s important to eat fewer eggs and that eating eggs is harmful to chickens) than women who viewed the lifestyle video. However, this was not the same for men. The researchers didn’t find a difference in compassionate attitudes towards chickens between men who viewed the advocacy video and men who viewed the lifestyle video.

The participants’ degree of speciesism also changed how effective the advocacy video was. Those low in speciesism were more likely to say they intended to eat fewer eggs after watching the advocacy video compared to the lifestyle video. However, participants high in speciesism were no more likely to change their egg consumption intentions after watching the advocacy video compared to the lifestyle video. Interestingly, participants’ social dominance orientation didn’t change how effective the advocacy video was.

Given these findings, the demographics and personality traits of target groups are important factors for animal advocates and organizations to consider. As previous studies have suggested, it might be more effective to direct advocacy efforts towards those most receptive — namely, women and people without strong speciesist beliefs — especially when the efforts include sharing video footage of animal suffering.

It’s important to note that this is among the first studies to look at how individual differences impact the effectiveness of animal advocacy. More studies investigating different advocacy methods (e.g., text-based, conversation-based) and participant characteristics (e.g., different cultures, more comprehensive gender identities) would be helpful for advocates to know the most effective way to reach diverse groups of people.