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Public Acceptability Of Standard U.S. Animal Agriculture Practices (Faunalytics)

Faunalytics surveyed approximately 1,000 U.S. adults on their perceptions of standard animal agriculture practices. The findings provide U.S. legal advocates with empirical data to support arguments that certain industry norms are not “commonly accepted” by the public and should therefore not be exempt from U.S. anti-cruelty laws.

Key Findings

  1. A clear majority of the U.S. public finds standard animal agriculture practices for pigs, cows, and chickens to be unacceptable, ranging from 71% to 85%, depending on the practice. Indeed, only a minority of people found standard practices to be acceptable, ranging from 7% to 16%.
  2. Confinement practices were the most unacceptable practices, including battery cages for laying hens (85%), gestation crates for pigs (84%), and cramped barns for broiler chickens (82%). Additionally, killing newborn male chicks who can’t lay eggs with a macerator was also considered widely unacceptable (84%). In contrast, killing pigs in gas chambers and killing chickens by live-shackle were some of the most acceptable practices (16% and 12% saying it’s acceptable, respectively), although the majority of the U.S. public still found them unacceptable (71% and 77% saying it’s unacceptable, respectively).
  3. Women/non-binary people and Democrats, on average, find standard animal agriculture practices more unacceptable than men and Republicans. Ranging from 1 to 5, or from “very acceptable” to “very unacceptable,” men (average score = 4.1) and Republicans (average = 4.0) rated standard practices as less unacceptable than women and non-binary people (average = 4.3) and Democrats (average = 4.4). These differences were statistically significant. Still, most people, regardless of their gender, age, race/ethnicity, region, income, or political affiliation, viewed the practices as unacceptable overall. Across all groups, the lowest average across all items was 4 (“somewhat unacceptable”) and the highest was 4.4 (between “somewhat unacceptable” and “very unacceptable”).

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