Abstract:

In 2017, two frameworks for the Portuguese education system were published, in which the importance of approaching the Animal Welfare issue in all school cycles was proposed for the first time, following the interest in the subject at an international level. These frameworks suggest a focus on different topics of social and environmental relevance, leaving to schools the possibility of choice according to their educational project and the motivations of teachers and students. This would mean a rethinking of teacher training courses, since environmental education in teacher training is rarely concerned with animal welfare issues.

Therefore, the present study sought to investigate the position of pre-service teachers on different animal uses and the reasons they give in favour or against them, given that the subject has not been covered in their training. Thus, starting from an activity created and made available by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA), a questionnaire was administered in Google Forms, to which 72 pre-service teachers responded.

It included 12 situations involving animals, contextualized with a picture accompanied by an explanatory heading. To each situation the respondents were invited to take a position in relation to three possibilities:
i) acceptable
ii) unacceptable or
iii) acceptable in certain situations.

Regardless of their choice, a justification was requested. The situations included were: captivity and conditioning: parrot in a cage, panda in a zoo, lion in a circus, shark in an aquarium, falconry display; use of pets and care; instrumental uses for food, clothing and research: livestock transport, free-range chickens, lobster boiled alive in a pot, guinea pig in a laboratory.

The activities that were considered unacceptable by more than 50% of the respondents were the lion in the circus (81.9%) and the wearing of fur (69.4%). The most acceptable activities were the dog at the vet’s (97.2%), the guide dog (84.7%) and the free-range chickens (95.8). A greater number of situations were considered acceptable in certain cases: parrot in a cage (50%), livestock transport (48.6%), panda in a zoo (56.9%), falconry display (50.0%), and guinea pig in a laboratory (56.9%). The justifications were focused on animal welfare but also on human welfare, which, in several situations, had a higher frequency (e.g. in the use of guinea pigs in research and even in the death of live lobsters in hot water as a guarantee of freshness of the food). From the justifications it was also possible to detect several misconceptions about the topics under analysis and even a lack of knowledge of some of the situations, as was the case of the age-old tradition of falconry, which was even improbably compared with the captivity of birds in cages; the strong belief in the conservationist role of zoos and aquariums, and even of circuses, which can unfortunately not often be verified, and ignorance of alternatives to the use of animals in research.

The results of the present study can be important for the introduction of animal welfare issues in teacher training, as it will inform the approach to the various topics covered, based on the respondents’ own ideas. It also can help to define training strategies that will help to correct the wrong ideas detected during the survey, thus contributing to the training of future teachers and a more consistent approach to animal welfare issues with their future students.

Keywords:

Animal welfare, Instrumental uses of animals, Pre-service teachers’ views, Teacher training.