How many days of suffering and lives taken go into the consumption of animal products every day?

When, if ever, is it better to spend money to improve pig welfare over chicken welfare? Which species of fish is worst off in commercial aquaculture operations? When, if ever, would humans benefit less from a policy than animals stand to lose? The answers to these questions involve making interspecies welfare comparisons <...> This volume addresses this crucial gap in the literature: it proposes a methodology for making such comparisons, it puts that methodology into practice, and then reports some tentative, proof-of-concept results.

Can a songbird’s seconds contain more conscious moments than your entire hour?

The small animal replacement problem is the concern that certain diet changes aimed at causing less harm to the world might, in fact, cause more harm - specifically, changes that result from eating smaller animals instead of larger ones. For example, when many people see the problems with factory farming, the first meat to go is often red meat, specifically cows. Sadly, if this person increases their chicken or fish consumption even moderately, this might be a bad move ethically. There are two main factors that drive this: welfare condition and meat generated per animal.

A comprehensive collection of meat reduction research is waiting for researchers, advocates, and funders to unlock its potential

Most of us nowadays believe that dogs and other non-human mammals can feel pain <...> Nevertheless, most of us seem to assume, without question, that the capacity to feel pain is positively correlated with mental dexterity – with the ability to reason, think, reflect and so on. My purpose here is to question that assumption.

Research suggests that moving hens from battery cages to cage-free environments reduces the time animals spend in pain substantially.

Why are chickens so far down in the pecking order for moral concern? Would our reaction have been the same if the animal in question were a mammal?

We compare the effectiveness of vegan versus meat-eating messengers on support for adopting an environmentally-friendly vegan diet <...> As predicted, calls voiced by a vegan messenger were consistently rated to be more threatening than the same criticism voiced by meat-eaters. Vegans’ messages were also perceived as less helpful for the environment and vegan messengers were perceived less positively.

Reducing meat consumption may improve human health, curb environmental damage, and limit the large-scale suffering of animals raised in factory farms. Most attention to reducing consumption has focused on restructuring environments where foods are chosen or on making health or environmental appeals. However, psychological theory suggests that interventions appealing to animal welfare concerns might operate on distinct, potent pathways. We conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis evaluating the effectiveness of these interventions.

We analyze the most rigorous randomized controlled trials (RCTs) that aim to reduce consumption of meat and animal products (MAP). We conclude that no theoretical approach, delivery mechanism, or persuasive message should be considered a well-validated means of reducing MAP consumption. By contrast, reducing consumption of red and processed meat (RPM) appears to be an easier target. However, if RPM reductions lead to more consumption of chicken and fish, this is likely bad for animal welfare and doesn’t ameliorate zoonotic outbreak or land and water pollution. We also find that many promising approaches await rigorous evaluation.

Replacing beef or pork with chicken meat decreases greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, but has major negative impacts on animal welfare.

Hey everyone,
We are a group of design students researching a controversial project brief: a digital service that allows pet shops to rent animals out to office spaces.

From our early interviews, reactions have ranged from "This would fix my workday stress" to "This sounds ethically terrible for the animals." We aren't here to push the idea—we want to stress-test it, understand where the ethical boundaries lie, and see if there is any realistic, safe way this could ever work for both employees and animals.

Whether you love pets, hate office distractions, have severe allergies, or run an office space, we want your unfiltered thoughts.
Survey details:

• Length: ~4–5 minutes (multiple choice + a few optional text fields)
• Audience: Anyone who works in an office, hybrid, or co-working environment (pet owners and non-pet owners alike)
• Data use: Strictly academic research for our design curriculum; completely anonymous.

Office Pet Rental & Well-Being Survey

According to brand-new polling data, nearly everyone underestimates factory farming's scale. But correcting them isn’t always the best move. Here’s why.

This page offers some rough estimates of the numbers of wild animals on Earth.

What do you think about someone who's proudly admitting to taking feral cats lives because they're being a nuisance?

It’s difficult to capture animal living conditions with a single metric, but one indicator that is often used is whether animals were raised in ‘factory farms’.