“How equestrians conceptualise horse welfare: Does it facilitate or hinder change? Luke et al, 2023”
A new paper on equestrians attitudes to horse welfare was published on 1st September 2023.
“Using reflexive thematic analysis, three themes were identified:
(1) good horse welfare is tangible;
(2) owners misinterpret unwanted horse behaviour;
(3) equestrians publicly minimise horse welfare issues but are privately concerned.”
“….participants’ ideal of prioritising horse welfare does not align with their practice; and there is inconsistency between what participants share publicly and what they think privately about horse welfare.”
However, when you realise this is only the results from interviewing 19 Australian amatuer equestrians, it’s hard to imagine this is representative, even if the three themes might be what you would expect to find. On the other hand, some of the discussion is interesting and of value to the ongoing debate about SLO.
The link below is to the full article which is OPEN ACCESS (i.e. free to all).
Do you think the three themes identified would be similar if this was run elsewhere? UK? USA? Canada? France? Germany? Spain?
