My How Cute You Are! An Examination of the Factors that Predict the Likelihood of Research Protocol Approval in a Mock Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee

While research suggests that the level of public support for the use of animal models in biomedical research remains high, there is considerable ambivalence driven by a variety of personal attitudes, personality traits, and misperceptions about animal research. In the present investigation, individuals within the academic community of a college - undergraduate and graduate students - were presented with a mock research proposal that varied by species. As part of a mock Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC), the research participants received a request to review a research protocol and render a decision to either approve or reject the research proposal. In addition to a series of demographic items, the participants were queried about the perceived importance of the project, the suffering of the animals, and the amount the researcher has dissociated from the well-being of the animals. Last, the participants answered a series of items from a research-derived Perceptions About the Use of Animals Scale and the Emotional Intelligence Scale (EIS). Consistent with the reports of other investigators, female respondents were much less likely to approve the research protocol than male participants. Protocol approval rates varied as a function of the proposed species, with the use of certain species generally receiving less support. The ethical issues associated with the use of animals in experiments are briefly considered as well as the need for additional messaging about the role of animal research in the furtherance of biomedical research objectives.