How many animals are neglected every year

Try out PMC Labs and tell us what you think. Learn More. Preventing animal cruelty and neglect is the goal of animal protection. But it is hard to effectively address a problem without a good understanding of its prevalence and nature. While 55,—60, reports of mistreatment are made to the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals RSPCA in Australia each year, we do not know how well these data reflect what is actually happening in the community.

After all, these data are reliant on people reporting what they see and therefore, probably only represent a fraction of what is actually occurring.

To better understand this problem, we conducted the first extensive community survey to find out what people had seen in their communities and what they did about it. We found that animal mistreatment was 1 common, with While sobering, these findings are the first step to developing and resourcing well-informed strategies to prevent the mistreatment of animals.

While animal mistreatment is common worldwide, its true scale is largely unknown. Currently, organisations rely on community reporting case data and trends found therein to inform prevention activities. Overall, No differences in prevalence were found between LGAs when socio-economic index and local government comparator group were controlled for.

However, participants in regional cities recalled witnessing more separate incidents than those in metropolitan or interface areas. Attitudes to reporting were positive but did not predict reporting behaviour.

Together, these results demonstrate that case data are not reliable indicators of the true prevalence of animal mistreatment; it is common and grossly underreported, highlighting the need for effective, evidence-based prevention programs.

Animal mistreatment is a complex issue that affects countless animals worldwide [ 1 ]. Differences exist in the literature and the common vernacular regarding the use and meaning of terms such as cruelty, neglect, abuse and maltreatment. In Australia, around 55,—60, reports of animal mistreatment are made each year to the RSPCA [ 2 ], approximately 11, of which are made in the state of Victoria [ 3 ]. Taking the lead from more developed fields of prevention and intervention such as interpersonal violence and public health, understanding the extent of such an issue is the first crucial step in developing informed intervention strategies [ 8 ].

Previous research has investigated the prevalence of overt animal cruelty in non-representative samples of various subpopulations e. Additionally, one study examined the prevalence of self-reported intentional animal abuse in two cities in Russia and Ukraine [ 12 ]. However, to date, there has been no empirical investigation of the prevalence of animal mistreatment including both neglect and cruelty in the general community and it is unknown how accurate a reflection official case data reports made by the community are of what is actually occurring in the community.

Consequently, it is likely that the true scale of the problem has been largely overlooked. It is crucial to understand this for informed and effective policy and resourcing decisions to be made. Using the only information available to them, animal welfare organisations and researchers have taken to analysing case data and even more limiting, prosecution records, for various trends [ 13 , 14 , 15 ].

That is, some LGAs have consistently high numbers of cases, while others have low numbers of cases. However, it is also found that the majority of complaints relate to issues of neglect rather than intentional cruelty. The observed differences between LGAs have also prompted interest in region specific intervention programs where there are high numbers of cases [ 23 ].

However, it is unknown if these differences in the number of cases between LGAs represent a true difference in prevalence of animal mistreatment, or merely differences in reporting.

Indeed, many factors may influence reporting behaviour and an alternate explanation of these trends is that people in areas with high numbers of cases actually care more about animals and are therefore more likely to report when they see something wrong. Consequently, in order to understand how case data trends relate to the actual prevalence of mistreatment, it is also important to understand how and why members of the community respond to witnessing instances of mistreatment; what do they do and why do they do it?

Of particular interest is why people choose to report or not to authorities. While factors influencing reporting have been examined in other criminal situations [ 24 ], only one study that we are aware of has investigated this with regard to animal mistreatment. While these are interesting findings, only one of these factors is open to change awareness of the link between animal cruelty and family violence and it would be beneficial for prevention initiatives to understand more about the attitudinal factors that influence reporting.

Therefore, the aim of this study was to gain a more objective understanding of the prevalence and types of animal mistreatment in Victoria, as well as how the community responds to witnessing mistreatment and why. Specifically, we aimed to determine how areas with high numbers of RSPCA Victoria cases differed with respect to these factors prevalence, types, actions, and attitudes to similar areas with low numbers of cases. Not only will this information prove valuable for decision making and planning of prevention activities in Victoria, it will also serve as an indicator of the accuracy of case data and trends for organisations worldwide.

This project was conducted in accordance with the National Statement on Ethical Conduct in Human Research guidelines and regulations. All participants provided informed consent prior to partaking and were given the opportunity to withdraw their data upon completion of the task.

Four focus groups, consisting of between six and twelve participants, were conducted in February The aim of the focus groups was to elicit common attitudes and beliefs from the general community to inform item development for the subsequent Computer Assisted Telephone Interview CATI questionnaire. The sessions were conducted in person at community spaces library and a neighbourhood house in the City of Latrobe region.

The City of Latrobe region was used because a separate project, for which it was the focal site, provided the opportunity to conduct this work. The final sample consisted of 37 individuals, 26 female, 10 male, and 1 gender non-binary, aged from 18 to 65 years. No recruits were refused participation. Key themes discussed included attitudes towards animals, what constitutes mistreatment, and perceived prevalence of mistreatment.

Common themes and attitudes were identified for inclusion in the questionnaire. Demographic questions age, education, country of birth, income bracket were also included.

To estimate the prevalence of animal mistreatment, we investigated the number of incidents of mistreatment participants could recall witnessing in the past 12 months. However, animal mistreatment is a subjective topic; what one person considers to be mistreatment, another may not. If they answered yes to any of these, they were asked on how many separate occasions i. These descriptions were based on commonly used descriptors or guidelines used by RSPCA employees when determining whether a situation likely involves mistreatment.

For each type of mistreatment that a participant had witnessed, they were then asked what they did, or most recently did if there were multiple occasions, after witnessing it.

Participants selected one option for each type of mistreatment they had witnessed from the following list: 1.

Made a report to the local council, 3. Made a report to a government department or other statutory authority, 4. Made a report to Police, 5.

Discussed your concern with a professional, e. Sought advice from a family member or friend, 7. Other, please specify , 8. The response options were randomised in order to prevent response bias. Their responses were then categorised by the telephone interviewer to pre-programmed responses: 1.

I was unsure whether mistreatment was actually taking place, 2. I was not sure whether it was against the law, 3. I thought I might make the situation worse for the animal, 8.

Someone else told me not to, 9. I was concerned about the person finding out it was me, I was concerned about retaliation or backlash from the person involved, I was worried the animal would be euthanized, Other Specify , There were no such situations I always did something.

I thought the situation was improving, Stray or feral animal, Someone else was taking action, Participants were also asked a series of attitudinal questions related to reporting animal mistreatment.

These items were modelled off the Theory of Planned Behaviour TPB , one of the most widely used models of human behaviour [ 26 ]. The TPB identifies behaviour as an outcome of three attitudinal elements: 1 attitudes towards the behaviour itself, 2 subjective norms, and 3 perceived behavioural control [ 27 ]. While attitudes are difficult to measure directly, they can be inferred by responses to belief statements related to these three elements; 1 beliefs about the behaviour itself and its outcomes, 2 normative beliefs about how significant others would expect the individual to behave, and 3 beliefs about the degree of control the individual has over performing the behaviour [ 27 ].

Relevant beliefs were identified through the focus groups and in consultation with industry experts. Two additional belief statements that did not clearly fall into these categories were also incorporated as they were commonly expressed by focus group participants. Attitudinal items were scored on five-point Likert-type scales Table 2 and randomised in order. Questions were pre-tested for comprehension and relevance with a range of people known to the researchers. The first evening of survey delivery was used as a pilot, with feedback from telephone operators leading to minor grammatical modifications.

As one of the key aims of the study was to determine the accuracy of case data with regard to observed trends between LGAs, select LGAs were chosen for sampling as opposed to a state-wide representative survey. A representative survey of Victoria would not allow for comparison of LGAs or identification of trends, because, unless the sample size was very large, the number of participants from each area would be small and provide unreliable estimates.

To do this, all 79 Victorian LGAs were ranked based on the raw numbers of reported cases and per capita cases over the preceding 3 years — The ten highest ranked high numbers of cases and ten lowest ranked low number of cases LGAs were considered for selection.

Of the ten highest ranked HR LGAs, a regional city City of Latrobe was selected, being the highest ranked, along with an inner-city region City of Melbourne and an interface peri-urban region Yarra Ranges Shire , to gain a better representation of the various region types that exist within Victoria.

No interface councils appeared in the ten lowest ranked LGAs. Consequently, the interface councils with the lowest rank were considered, despite them not appearing in the bottom ten. This pairing of HR and LR LGAs allowed for more meaningful interpretation of results by limiting the number of variables between comparators. Questionnaire delivery was contracted to the Social Research Centre, a data collection subsidiary of the Australian National University specialising in social and health research.

For mobile numbers, a pre-notification SMS message was sent prior to phoning to provide the opportunity to opt-out and improve the likelihood people would answer the phone. To facilitate a more representative sample, in each call the operator requested to speak to the person living in the household aged 18 years or over who was to have the next birthday.

Population representative quotas were set for gender and age. Data collection spanned four weeks from 29 April to 27 May All variables were screened using descriptive analyses. As such, all attitude items were used in the analyses reported here. The relationship between attitudes towards reporting and reporting behaviour was first examined with biserial correlations.

The correlations between attitude items and reporting behaviour were weak and while logistic regression and discriminant function analysis were trialed, they yielded poor results accordingly. As such, these analyses were not appropriate and have not been reported.

The relationship between reporting and other demographic variables was examined using chi-square tests. A total of individuals were surveyed with respondents each from Latrobe, Yarra Ranges, Melbourne, Stonnington, and Wyndham, and from Mildura.

The majority of respondents Most respondents No difference between paired high ranked HR and low ranked LR Local Government Areas in the proportion of people who had witnessed at least one incident of mistreatment in the past 12 months. Decision-based critical F value for F[0. Overall, the mean number of separate incidents witnessed was Additionally, as the group with the larger sample size had the larger variance, this would result in a loss of statistical power, and yet a significant difference was still detected.

As demonstrated in Figure 1 , the most commonly witnessed form of mistreatment overall was underweight animals separate incidents , followed by excessive numbers of animals such that the owner could not care for them appropriately incidents. Underweight animals and excessive number of animals were the most common types of mistreatment witnessed across the sample.

However, the most common forms of mistreatment witnessed differed between the LGAs Figure 2. Most common types of mistreatment witnessed differed between Local Government Areas mistreatment types with low frequency omitted for ease of visualisation. For each type of mistreatment a participant had witnessed, they were asked what they did in response, or what they most recently did if there were multiple incidents of the same mistreatment type.

The sum of action responses for each LGA and the sample as a whole is provided in Table 5 with a graphical representation of their proportions provided in Figure 3.

While participants had witnessed mistreatment, many had witnessed multiple different types, hence the total number of recorded responses was Actions taken after witnessing animal mistreatment were varied.

Actions expressed as percentages of the total number of responses. Sum of action responses by participants who had witnessed mistreatment across each Local Government Area and overall. This was consistent across all LGAs individually except Wyndham, where the most common response was to discuss the situation with friends or family.

However, there was no statistically significant difference for the interface pair. Reponses to witnessing animal mistreatment also varied between different types of mistreatment. No action was the most common response for eight of the ten types of mistreatment. Generally, attitudes towards reporting animal mistreatment were positive. However, there were still people Biserial correlations between the attitude items and whether a person reported mistreatment were weak Table 7.

This conclusion was supported by the poor results produced by more detailed statistical analyses logistic regression and discriminant function analysis not reported here. Wild animals are usually kept in small cages and chains. This causes great psychological damage. Some wild captive animals even self-harm because of frustration. As we already mentioned, there is passive neglect and active abuse cruelty.

Neglect includes failing to provide animals with basic things, such as food, water, shelter, and vet care. On the other hand, abuse or active intentional cruelty is much more horrible. It includes the intentional causing of physical pain or injury.

Maiming, torturing, and killing animals are just a few examples. You should know that anti-cruelty laws exist in all 50 states. Generally, killing animals is a crime. Anyone who intentionally and maliciously kills an animal could face jail time in their state or county jail. The latest data reveals that in With more than reported animal cruelty cases per , people, Delaware takes this unfortunate win.

The state recently passed a law that should protect dogs from life-threatening weather. The law is supposed to prevent dogs from being tied outside for more than nine hours in extremely cold or hot weather. Yes, you can. As we mentioned, the laws differ from state to state, so the imprisonment duration can vary. However, killing animals unjustifiably will get you in jail. Unfortunately, as these animal abuse statistics have shown, animal cruelty is a genuine issue that takes millions of victims every year.

We hope that these statistics and facts will raise awareness of animal cruelty and help stop it. Good content writing is based on proper research and a thorough understanding of the English language.

For as long as he can remember, Aleksandar has been passionate about languages. Writing articles covering a variety of subjects like fitness, health, and self-improvement, as well as lighter ones like geekdom and pets, he prides himself on being able to tackle any topic you throw at him.

With a degree in English literature and linguistics, and years of experience in content writing and research work, he looks forward to every new writing challenge. Is anyone else having this problem or is it a problem on my end? We have, though, if you point out a fact or statistic that you feel is inaccurate we are more than happy to review it again.

Thank you for the constructive criticism. You absolutely have excellent posts. Regards for sharing with us your webpage. Thanks so much for the excellent statistics and your obvious dedication to mitigating the obscene acts of cruelty perpetrated by humans. Animal agriculture is the vilest industry in my opinion — spawned by hatchlings of Satan. This is the one that is a cause for public outrage and insomnia yet these are a protected species — the untouchables.

With 8 I feel that statistic is far too low. Your email address will not be published. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Every year, more than 10 million animals die from abuse in the US alone. Over , horses in the US are killed for human consumption. On average, , animals every year are victims of animal hoarding. There are over 10, puppy mills in the United States.

More than million animals are used for laboratory experiments yearly. General Animal Abuse Facts and Statistics There are various types of animal cruelty: organized cruelty like dogfighting and cockfighting , neglect, and intentional cruelty, and many more.

Statistics of animal abuse reveal that every 60 seconds, one animal suffers abuse. Fabiosa Animal cruelty facts report that dogs are the most common victims of this cruelty. There are two types of animal abuse: passive and active cruelty. Animal Abuse Facts about animal cruelty reveal that passive cruelty mainly includes animal neglect cases. HSUS Animal cruelty facts and stats show a clear correlation between domestic violence and animal abuse. Children who are sexually abused are 5 times more likely to abuse animals as per statistics for animal abuse.

NCBI Research has shown that men are the most likely to abuse animals. Statistics on animal cruelty reveal that very year, more than 10 million animals die from abuse in the US alone. Letters to the Next President However, as the animal abuse statistics for reveal, only 1, animal abuse cases are presented by the media every year.

Every year, more than 6. The latest animal abuse stats reveal that each year, the US kills over 3 million mink for fur. HSI Stats on animal abuse show that one hundred million animals suffer each year because of the fur trade. Their only purpose: to become a fashion accessory.

HSUS Greyhound racing is illegal in over 40 states. Animal abuse statistics in America reveal that more than , horses are killed and processed for human consumption. HSUS Fortunately, many slaughterhouses have been shut down over the years. Animal Legal Defense Fund The most outrageous form of animal abuse is animal hoarding. Statistics on animal abuse reveal that there are over 10, puppy mills in the United States.

HSUS Every year, these mills breed more than 2 million dogs for profit. Approximately 75, dogs are tortured in US labs every year. ISWMP Animal abuse statistics show that some universities go so far as to take dogs from shelters to use them in their experiments.

Every year, US labs abuse more than 19, cats. No animal is safe, not even in the wild. Industries torture and mutilate more than million animals each year. Most of them die in factory farms without ever seeing daylight, but others turn into victims of lab experiments and circus entertainers.

Even in the wild, humans poach rare species and destroy habitats. No animal deserves such cruelty. All this death contributes to the alarming extinction rate, and soon there will be no going back.

So, help these animal abuse statistics reach more people who care, and treat each creature you meet with kindness and respect. Getting a calming dog bed or treats is a good way to ease the anxiety these dogs often experience in a new environment.

Sign in. Forgot your password? Get help. Password recovery. Pawsome Advice. Disturbing Animal Cruelty Facts One animal is abused every minute. Annually, over 10 million animals in the US are abused to death. Laboratory testing uses million animals in experiments every year. Consumption is at fault for the yearly death of more than , horses in the US. Animal Abuse Stats in Animal cruelty has different faces.