Understanding Generation Z is essential for the future of social movements, especially in animal and environmental protection. A new study from Faunalytics and Good Growth Co. explores Gen Z’s attitudes toward animals, climate, and activism across the U.S., Indonesia, Thailand, and China. Findings reveal strong preferences for eco-friendly products, skepticism about society’s efforts to protect animals and the environment, and a focus on companion and wild animals over farmed animals. Motivations vary, with many blaming bad-faith actors over systemic issues. The report also highlights key cultural differences, offering valuable insights into this influential generation.
https://faunalytics.org/exploring-gen-zs-attitudes-towards-animals-and-the-environment/
Key Findings
- University-educated Gen Z respondents across the four countries hold positive attitudes towards animal and environmental protection. A vast majority (93%) expressed concern for these issues, and 86% indicated a preference for purchasing environmentally and animal-friendly products. 84% reported having altered their behaviors to support environmental or animal protection.
- Asian respondents are considerably more likely than U.S.-based respondents to report that they and their societies are doing enough to protect the environment and animal well-being. Over a third of Asian respondents feel their country is doing enough, with over 80% believing they are personally contributing sufficiently. In contrast, U.S. respondents reported more critical views of both their own actions and their culture, with less than half feeling they are doing enough personally, and only about 14% satisfied with societal efforts.
- Environmental actions and concerns are more common than animal actions or concerns, with farmed animals especially neglected. Respondents, particularly those in Asia, rarely mentioned farmed animals. When discussing pro-animal actions or attitudes, they focused more on companion animals and wild animals. This suggests that, without specific prompting, animal protection is more readily perceived as primarily about wild and companion animals, not farmed animals.
- When Gen Z changes their behavior, they tend to focus on mitigating personal harms rather than engaging proactively. Although most respondents reported making adjustments to their behavior to help protect animals or the environment, these were largely actions like recycling, avoiding single-use plastics, and choosing eco- or animal-friendly products to reduce one’s own environmental or animal-related harms. However, a minority described a wide range of more proactive or regenerative actions, such as tree planting, volunteering, advocacy, or adopting stray animals. This active minority demonstrates a potential pathway for others to deepen their engagement with these causes.
- Motivations to act are both anthropocentric (human-focused) and animal/environment-focused. Respondents across all survey countries supported environmental action to protect people from ongoing harms, safeguard the lives of future generations, and to preserve nature as a good in itself. However, when specifically discussing action to protect animals, people are more likely to cite benefits to the animals themselves. Regional variations are striking, with Chinese respondents placing greater emphasis on the human-centric benefits of environmental and animal action compared to those in other surveyed nations.
- Gen Z’s barriers to further action are practical and emotional, not ideological. Participants frequently cited practical reasons (like financial barriers) and/or emotional reasons (like despair or futility) over ideological reasons (such as not believing in the cause) as major barriers to action. The near absence of ideological opposition suggests that advocates can have greater impact by identifying and addressing the practical and emotional barriers that prevent action, rather than focusing on changing core values or beliefs.
- Perceived barriers and solutions to environmental and animal issues varied significantly by country. Indonesian respondents almost universally cited lack of education and awareness as a primary barrier, and suggested grassroots advocacy or education-based solutions. Chinese respondents were most likely to highlight cultural attitudes, including apathy, feelings of helplessness, and adherence to harmful traditional norms, as significant barriers to action. In contrast, respondents in the U.S. and Thailand were more likely to emphasize the roles of corporate interests and capitalist structures, often favoring political or top-down approaches to address these challenges.
- Gen Z respondents usually attributed problems more to individual actions and attitudes rather than to systemic factors. Respondents frequently blamed issues on ignorance, individual malevolence or specific cultural practices, rather than the broader systemic problems inherent in areas like factory farming and extractive industries. This trend was stronger in Asia than the U.S.
To view Key Findings by country, please refer to the Country-Level Insights section of this report.
Background
Any social movement with longevity needs to court younger generations as potential leaders, advocates, and supporters. It’s therefore vital for both the animal protection and environmental movements to understand how Generation Z (Gen Z) adults view these critical issues and their potential roles in addressing them.
Gen Z is often portrayed as more environmentally aware than older generations, as reflected by large-scale movements like Fridays for Future, sparked by Greta Thunberg, but variation between countries appears to be significant. Studies have found that younger people in Australia, Poland, the U.S., and France are more concerned about climate change than older generations, whereas in Japan, the opposite is observed, and there are no strong trends in the UK.
When it comes to pro-animal attitudes, young people across 14 geopolitically diverse nations stated that the welfare of companion, farmed, and wild animals matters to them—albeit to varying degrees depending on the species (Sinclair et. al. 2022). Likewise, when comparing the importance of a broad range of social issues, environmental protection, animal protection, and sustainable development ranked the highest for young people across 12 diverse nations (Sinclair et. al. 2017). What still remains unknown are the pro-environmental and pro-animal behaviours that this generation displays, why they choose the behaviours, and to what extent they consider moving deeper into these fields.
This study investigates these gaps—illuminating the perspectives, actions, and career plans of university-educated Gen Z adults (aged 18-26) on environmental and animal protection across four countries: the United States of America, China, Thailand, and Indonesia. These countries were selected for their scale, regional importance, and roles in global animal trade and agriculture, providing a range of perspectives that can offer strategic insights for potential movement leaders in varied contexts. The findings aim to inform global advocacy strategies, messaging, and engagement efforts for young people pursuing careers in these fields.
Conclusions
This study sought to understand how Gen Z approaches animal protection and environmental issues across diverse cultural contexts, examining their perceived societal barriers, proposed solutions, and the translation of attitudes into concrete actions and career choices. While our findings revealed significant cross-cultural variations, they also showed that concern for animals and the environment remains consistently present across all surveyed countries, even as the expression and understanding of these issues takes distinctly different forms. Particularly striking was how local cultural and economic contexts shaped not just what young people saw as problems, but also how they envisioned solutions and their own potential roles in creating change.
Many key findings emerged with particular relevance for advocacy efforts. We found that environmental concerns consistently overshadow animal protection issues, with farmed animals being especially neglected in favor of companion and wild animals, particularly in Asian countries. We also found that, while motivations to act were often driven by beliefs in the importance of positive change for humans, animals, and the environment, reasons for inaction typically stem from practical and emotional factors rather than ideological opposition, suggesting that finding tangible solutions—whether in removing career obstacles or obstacles to everyday actions—may be more effective than attempts to shift fundamental values. We also identified significant country-specific variations in how young people perceive both problems and solutions, highlighting the need for culturally-tailored approaches:
In the United States, while a lower level of interest in action and careers may pose certain challenges, the young people in the U.S. show a robust foundation for progress, including a trend towards dietary shifts and awareness of concrete career pathways in the sector.
In China, although many young people expressed cynicism about individual impact, there are encouraging signs of expanding moral consideration, particularly evident in growing concern for companion and stray animals, which could be leveraged for greater impact. A small but active contingent of youth effectively leveraging social media platforms demonstrates the potential for creative advocacy approaches.
Indonesia presents a distinctive dynamic where education is viewed as both the primary barrier and solution. While this knowledge-centric perspective may overlook broader structural challenges, it's counterbalanced by strong enthusiasm for collective action and a deeply felt connection between human communities and their natural environment.
Thailand shows the most engaged youth cohort. Despite evident social tensions between Gen Z activists and other institutions within society, their strategic thinking about solutions, combined with high levels of engagement as well as career interests, suggests significant potential for effective advocacy work.
Based on these findings, we have made both global and country-specific practical recommendations for advocates throughout this report. The most pertinent of these can be summarized into three broader recommended approaches:
First, advocacy approaches must be carefully calibrated to acknowledge diverse social and economic realities within and between countries, as assumptions and associations with environmental or animal activism differ significantly across contexts. Strategically useful insights are frequently specific to a particular country, making it critical to tailor strategies by country rather than applying a blanket global approach. The latter has been shown to be less effective in general (Sinclair and Phillips, 2018). While our study identified some traits that align with a Western/Asian divide—such as political attitudes and levels of activism—it also revealed many differences that don't follow this regional categorization.
Second, narratives should expand beyond individual action to encompass systemic change. While many respondents attributed environmental and animal harms to individual behavior, often neglecting institutional barriers and systemic solutions, some young people across countries showed recognition that effective change requires working through public institutions, private sector initiatives, or broader social movements. Accelerating this shift from individual to a collective or institutional focus could help channel youth interest into more scalable and impactful forms of action.
Finally, advocates should be aware that there's a crucial need to broaden the animal welfare discourse beyond companion and charismatic wild animals to address the neglected suffering of farmed animals. Animal protection received less attention and was typically discussed in the context of charismatic wild animals, strays, animal testing, or unusual cases of animal abuse. Discussions around farmed animals were universally neglected, with occasional mentions linked to vegetarianism or veganism, mainly in the U.S. This limited focus requires attention, particularly in Asia, where highlighting the scale of farmed animal suffering could present an opportunity for meaningful impact. Encouragingly, many respondents naturally connected animal and environmental causes, suggesting opportunities to integrate farmed animal welfare into broader sustainability narratives through 'one-health and one-welfare' frameworks, while creating clearer pathways for young people to engage with both causes.
While educated youths across the world represent a promising force for environmental and animal protection, there are challenges associated with harnessing this force. Where popular narratives suggest stronger pro-environmental and pro-animal attitudes among youth, our findings show that these attitudes may not be comprehensively held with regards to animal types, and that translating these attitudes into action faces distinct cultural and practical challenges. However, we found encouraging signs: the near-absence of ideological opposition, evidence of strategic institutional-level thinking (particularly in the U.S. and Thailand), diverse motivations for action, and broad enthusiasm for related careers (especially in Southeast Asia). These insights provide a clearer roadmap for engaging young people effectively across different cultural contexts, suggesting that with the right approach, the promise of youth engagement in these vital causes can be realized.
Many thanks for sharing this study on Generation Z's attitudes toward animals and the environment across different countries.
For me, the universal neglect of farmed animals was unexpected and stands out. Despite general concern for animal welfare, respondents across all countries primarily focused on companion animals and wildlife, with farmed animals rarely mentioned - especially in Asian countries. This blind spot seems significant given the scale of factory farming globally.