It is generally perceived that women are more sensitive than men to animals welfare, and there is ample evidence of females being more empathetic toward animal issues [1–7]. Phillips and McCulloch [5] investigated the beliefs of students of different nationalities on both animal sentience and attitudes towards the uses of animals, and found that female students had more concern than males for animal welfare and rights. Gender did not influence the students' beliefs about the degree of sentience of a range of animal species. In another survey, the use of animals in research was more opposed by women than men across a range of countries, including Great Britain, USA, Japan, France and Germany [8]. Further evidence of females' greater interest in animal issues is provided by the composition of animal rights activist organisations, who according to a study by Einwohner [9] are predominantly female, at least in the USA.

The difference between cohabiting females and males in their attitude to animals may depend on the extent of social dominance in partnerships. In a survey of college students in the southern USA, Hyers [10] found a positive relationship between Social Dominance Orientation (a measure of support for a hierarchical social structure and inequality favouring their group over others) and endorsement of the use of animals for “luxury” and “non-luxury” purposes. This relationship may also exist in different countries, influenced by the socio-political situation and cultural heritage, including religion. For example, some countries have a long history of religious instruction supporting both male dominance in society and the use of animals, whereas others do not. A survey by Baxter and Kane [11] conducted in five countries (USA, Australia, Canada, Norway and Sweden) found that women with high social, economic and interpersonal dependence on men had attitudes more similar to men. Generally societies with high levels of gender equality are also more supportive of environmental protection, suggesting that these two societal characteristics, attitudes towards animals and towards environmental protection, at least coexist and may be interdependent [12].

As part of an international survey of attitudes to animals, we examined whether social dominance differences between countries influence attitudes towards the use of animals, by surveying the student population in a range of Eurasian countries. Previous research has identified a range of indices that can be used to measure attitudes to different aspects of use of animals from this survey [13], and we utilised these to obtain a better understanding of male and female attitudes to animal welfare and rights in different nations. This may promote understanding of their different needs in relation to teaching about animals, or to teaching with the aid of animals, and also to animal product consumption.

A total of 3,432 responses (1,902 female and 1,530 males) were obtained from an estimated 16,700 students that provided their e-mail addresses in 103 universities (Table 1).

This survey used novel techniques for recruitment of students across a major part of Europe and Asia, which is a logistical problem that has made this type of research difficult in the past. We acknowledge that the method of contacting students may have influenced the level of participation or engagement—direct email or being approached on campus. In addition for students approached on campus transcription errors or students giving erroneous email addresses was another potential problem that may have reduced the response rate. However, with recent development of opportunities for electronic transfer of survey forms and responses, such techniques offer the possibility to investigate global attitudes much more easily than in the past. Because of the scale and breadth of the survey, co-ordination of collaborators' activities assumed a major importance. One area in which difficulties could potentially be experienced was translation as it was impossible with so many countries to arrange back-translation, as is usually advocated for such cross-cultural research [17,18]. However, we attempted to ensure consistency of meaning by effective checking of the translated version and discussion of discrepancies with the translator. Another potential limitation of the study was that it utilised student respondents, who may vary between countries in their representativeness of the general population.

The greater concern of females than males for animal welfare has been enunciated previously by several authors [1,2,4-6]. In a similar but smaller survey to the current one, female students had more concern for both animal suffering during life and the reverence for animal life than males [5]. Heleski et al. [4] found greater empathy for agricultural animal welfare in females than males. As well as animal welfare, we found a similar increase in concern for animal rights by females, compared with males. Peek et al. [19] suggests that this may be because of the relational role of women in society, having primary responsibility for nurturing, empathy and care towards others. Patriarchal domination was recommended as an alternative influence and suitable subject for future study [20]. Cultural feminist theory suggests that women make moral judgements based on relations rather than universal standards of right and wrong. Kruse [21] suggests that males support a primarily Darwinian view of animals, in which the natural world is exploited and controlled, whereas females have primarily a Romantic view of animals, with greater affection for them and concern for their ethical treatment.

We did not find any overall difference between males and females in attitudes to other animal issues, for example animal experimentation. However, Pifer et al. [8] found that women were more opposed to use of animal in research than men in 15 nations. Wells and Hepper [1] found that adult males disagreed less with the use of animals by humans than adult females, and women opposed medical testing of animals more strongly than men. A survey conducted in New Zealand also found that females were more concerned about the use of animals in research, testing and teaching than males [22]. The similarity between males and females in our survey in attitude to experimentation with animals may derive from the greater concern that female students had for their health, compared with males. This was evident in their eating preferences, with more females avoiding meat because of the possible impact on their health.

Female concern for animal welfare is also evidenced by veterinary student surveys. In a study by Paul and Podberscek [2], female students rated themselves as having significantly higher levels of emotional empathy with animals than did the male students. There was also a significant interaction between gender and year of study, with the female students maintaining relatively high levels of empathy throughout the three years, whereas the male students showed lower levels of empathy in their later years [2]. In a study by Serpell [6], female veterinary students displayed greater concern for possible instances of animal suffering than males, and prior experience with different animals, as well as rural background and farm experience, were also associated with attitude differences. Seventy-two percent of students reported that their interactions with animals (especially pets) had strongly influenced the development of their values [6]. Therefore it is possible that in our survey the much greater pet ownership by females than males was a driving force behind their attitude to animal welfare and rights. Greater ownership of pets by females than males in our survey is supported by the finding of Vidovic et al. [23] that females had a greater attachment to pets than males.

In the present study, it was found that there was no significant difference in perception of sentience of any animal species as a result of gender, except cats, dolphins, human infants and pigs. Phillips and McCullough [5] found no gender differences in attributed sentience of any animal in their survey, but dolphins and cats were not included. The greater attribution of sentience by females to human infants is expected because of their generally increased contact and nurturing responsibilities than males. Greater attributed sentience for cats in females than males is probably because cats tend to be preferred by females and dogs by males, and cats are seen as having more feminine characteristics, with dogs displaying masculine characteristics of activity, dominance, aggression [24]. More females than males identify themselves with cats, whereas dog appreciation is gender non-specific [24]. This gender difference in cat appreciation may also be evidenced by the tendency of females towards greater grief after cat death [25] and greater willingness of female French veterinarians to provide analgesia to cats [26], although these were both also evident for dogs. Females in our survey credited pigs with less sentience than males did, which may be because of a perceived lack of cleanliness in pigs, common in many cultures, with female respondents being disinclined to credit pigs with high levels of sentience as a result. Because our survey asked students to rank species by sentience, if females attributed greater sentience to human infants and cats, other species had to fall in rank. According to a survey of Prokop and Tunnicliffe [27], girls were less favourably inclined than boys to animals that may pose a threat, danger or disease risk to them, which may incline them towards cats and away from pigs that are perceived to pose a disease risk.

The Eurobarometer is one of the only instruments used to explore gender differences in animal welfare status and buying habits. According to the 2005 Eurobarometer [28], males rated the welfare and protection status of pigs and dairy cows more positively than female, whereas they were similar for laying hens. The 2007 Eurobarometer [29] found that more females (63%) displayed a “willingness to change usual place of shopping in order to buy welfare friendly produce” than males (59%). In our survey animal welfare was clearly a consideration for both male and female students in food choices. The 2005 Eurobarometer [28] asked participants “When you purchase meat (i.e., poultry, beef, pork, fish) do you think about the welfare/protection of the animals from which these meat products have been sourced”. More females responded positively to this question (49%) than males (38%). Our survey found that males were less likely to avoid some meats than females, but those that did were more likely to do so because of animal suffering and the environment than females, who were more likely to do so because of their health.

Neumark-Sztainer et al. [30] found that most adolescent vegetarians are female (81%), which was similar to the 78% in our survey. Others found that females tend to characterise meat and meat-eating experiences negatively, and red meat-eating is more common among males than females [31,32]. In the present study, female were also more likely than males to avoid meat, particularly the red meats, beef, lamb and to some extent pork. Clearly males have fewer ethical concerns about red meat consumption. This acceptance of the use of animals for human benefit appears to be greater in males, as they also have less concern about accepting xenografts from animals, which are mainly pigs [33]. The avoidance of red meat by females probably relates mainly to their greater concern for their health, with red meat consumption being associated with cardiovascular and cancer risks, in particular. However, some females may be aware that livestock that produce red meat are sometimes kept in inhumane conditions. The fact that eggs were avoided less by females than males, whereas there is much publicity given to inhumane treatment of laying hens, suggests that animal suffering may not be the main driver of food avoidance in women. Women could believe that they are able to eat eggs that are produced to high welfare standards, given the widespread availability of eggs that are sold under this premise. It is also possible that women are more anthropomorphic than men and bestow humanlike qualities more easily on mammals that are phylogenetically more similar to humans, deterring them from eating these animals more than less similar animals, such as hens. In the present study, females were found to be more sensitive to animal protection, professional ethics, environmental protection, racial equality, equality for LGBT, human euthanasia, rights of women and peace and security than males. A survey of Baxter and Kane [11] which was conducted in the USA, Australia, Canada, Norway and Sweden, demonstrated that men hold less egalitarian gender role attitudes than do women. In our study students in Norway, Sweden and Great Britain were most likely to display gender inequality in attitudes to animal welfare, with female students being generally more concerned about animal issues than male students. Women in Sweden, Norway and Great Britain have high Gender Empowerment Scores, relative to other EU27 countries, which includes measures of the proportion of women in parliaments and other senior positions with high incomes [34]. Women in these countries are relatively more economically independent than women in other countries in our survey; they are not so likely to marry and when they do it is at an older age [11]. The dependence of women on men in other countries encourages them to adopt masculine attitudes [11], which may explain why attitudes to animal issues were least similar for students in Sweden, Norway and Great Britain. Our regression models of GEM and F/M ratio of responses on the Animal Welfare and Rights Indices showed that Ireland was an outlier, but the sample was very small, less than any other country. It is highly likely that the gender disparity would be different for different issues, indeed we found this in our study. However, it is unwise to read too much into one point on the graph, i.e., one country.

The Human Development Report Office proposed both a Gender-related Development Index (GDI) and the Gender Empowerment Measure (GEM) as means of monitoring international progress in the development of women's capabilities [35]. In spite of the limitations of GEM; we favoured it because it reflects a higher level of gender empowerment and is positively associated with a more equal division of labour in the household [36]. The GEM has been criticised for measuring inequality mainly among the most educated and economically advantaged and failing to include important non-economic dimensions of decision-making power, both at the household level and over women's own bodies and sexuality [37]. In addition the data used for measuring disparity in income is problematic [16] and in our survey it failed to discriminate adequately between countries. However, despite this we believe that GEM remains the most appropriate measure for the purposes of this international comparison.

Female students have greater concern for animal welfare and rights than males, especially in countries where there is a low level of dependence of women on men. The increased concern of women contributes towards, but is not the main driver for, greater avoidance of meat, especially red meat. The longer association of females with pets than males may play a significant role in developing their attitude towards animals.