We all know “beauty is in the eye of the beholder”, but what about empathy?

We’re used to thinking that empathy is a constant, something we either have or don’t. But what if empathy depends more on context than we’d like to admit?

Have you ever wondered why we treat some animals differently than others, purely based on the category label we put on them? e.g. why is it not okay to do to dogs what is done to pigs?

A rabbit is a rabbit… until we decide it’s a pet
or a pest
or a lab animal
or food

And just like that, the same animal is treated in completely different ways…
The way we categorize an animal changes everything for that animal: how much empathy we feel, what rights we grant, and what we justify as acceptable…

Years ago, I came across an article investigating this concept in Italian veterinary students and wondered: would Dutch vet students show similar attitude differences? So, when I needed to find a subject for my Master Evidence Based Practice in Health Care thesis, I knew what research question I wanted to explore!

And now, after polishing my master thesis into an article and ‘surviving’ peer review “Pet, Pest, Profit: Patient! How Attitudes Toward Animals Among Veterinary Students in the Netherlands Differ According to Animal Categories and Student-Related Variables” has been published in the special issue on Empirical Animal and Veterinary Medical Ethics of the scientific journal Animals MDPI!

🔗 You can read it here: Pet, Pest, Profit: Patient! How Attitudes Toward Animals Among Veterinary Students in the Netherlands Differ According to Animal Categories and Student-Related Variables

Many thanks to Daniela Salvatori, Monique Janssens🌱, Mariska Leeflang, Martin Bryant, Franck L.B. Meijboom, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine (Utrecht University) and, of course, all the students who participated in the study!

And last but not least, a big shout out to my peeps at Caring Vets 💚 thank you for being my crowd!

💚Animalium Saluti!

AI generated visual of 4 ‘categories’ of rabbits