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Start date: 2021Subject: search.filters.subject.Attitude

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    Surveying pet owners’ attitudes towards roaming cats in Aotearoa New Zealand
    (Taylor and Francis Group on behalf of the New Zealand Veterinary Association, 2025-08-24) Awawdeh L; Waran N; Pearson M; Forrest RH
    Aim: To examine the attitudes of pet owners towards roaming cats in New Zealand. Materials and methods: Data was used from a survey of New Zealand residents aged over 18 conducted online between January and March 2019. Along with demographic questions, the respondents were asked, “Do you think that roaming pet dogs and cats are a problem?” (yes, no, never thought about it) and if they answered “yes”, were invited to explain their answers. Thematic analysis was applied to open-text responses focused on cats, while quantitative data were analysed using descriptive statistics. Results: Of a total of 2,744 participants, 2,292 answered the question regarding roaming pets, with 72% (n = 1,654) viewing roaming pets as problematic. While gender, ethnicity, and rural upbringing showed no significant association with this view, age, education level, place of residence, and pet ownership did. Explanations for their choice of answer were given by 1,479 respondents and highlighted key concerns about free-roaming pets including cats: compromised animal welfare due to risks and neglect; the need for more responsible pet ownership and owner education; calls for stricter regulations and enforcement, including mandatory microchipping and desexing, and regulating cats similarly to dogs; the negative influence of social media; the importance of desexing to control populations and improve behaviour; increased risks to the roaming animals themselves, other animals, humans, and the environment; nuisance behaviours; and differing opinions on whether roaming cats or dogs are more of an issue. Conclusion: The findings align with previous research indicating a growing but inconsistent public awareness of animal welfare and environmental impacts associated with free-roaming cats. They highlight the need for education and targeted policy to address inconsistencies in attitudes and promote responsible cat ownership. Clinical relevance: Addressing these issues through enhanced public education and policy measures will help to balance animal welfare with community safety and environmental protection.
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    "It's Just [Complicated] Sleep": Discourses of Sleep and Aging in the Media.
    (Oxford University Press, 2023-12) Breheny M; Ross I; Ladyman C; Signal L; Dew K; Gibson R
    The media are influential in shaping beliefs and attitudes on aging and health-related behaviors. Sleep is increasingly recognized as a key pillar for healthy aging. However, the role of media representations of sleep is yet to be assessed with regard to discourses of aging. Texts from New Zealand's main free online news source were collated using key words "sleep" together with "aging," "older," "elderly," or "dementia" between 2018 and 2021. Contents of 38 articles were interpreted using critical discourse analysis. Discursive constructions described an inevitable decline of sleep with aging, including impacts of both physiological decline and life stage transitions; sleep's role as both a remedy and risk for ill health and disease; and the simplification of solutions for self-managing sleep juxtaposed alongside recognition of its complexity. The audience of these complex messages is left in the invidious position of both pursuing sleep practices to prevent age-related decline, whilst also being told that sleep degradation is inevitable. This research demonstrates the complexity of media messaging and the fraught options it offers: good sleep as both a reasonable achievement to strive for and as impossibly idealistic. Findings mirror two predominant health identities available to older people, as responsible for resisting aging or as falling into inevitable decline. This reveals additional expectations around appropriate time use and behaviors with aging. More nuanced messaging that goes beyond sleep as a resource for health and waking productivity is recommended. Acknowledging the complexity of sleep, aging, and society could be the starting point of such adaptation.
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    Cultural efficacy predicts body satisfaction for Māori.
    (2021) Houkamau C; Stronge S; Warbrick I; Dell K; Mika J; Newth J; Sibley C; Kha KL
    This paper examines the relationship between body mass index (BMI), self-esteem and self-reported confidence and capability in expressing oneself culturally as Māori (cultural efficacy) for 5,470 Māori who participated in Te Rangahau o Te Tuakiri Māori me Ngā Waiaro ā-Pūtea | The Māori Identity and Financial Attitudes Study (MIFAS) in 2017. Adjusting for demographics, self-reported health, education and socio-economic status, we found that a higher BMI was associated with lower body satisfaction and self-esteem. However, higher scores on cultural efficacy were associated with higher levels of body satisfaction and self-esteem for respondents. Furthermore, the negative association between BMI and both body satisfaction and self-esteem was weaker for those with higher cultural efficacy. This held for BMI scores of 25, 30, and 35+. While our data suggest higher cultural efficacy may directly or interactively shield Māori from developing lowered self-esteem typically associated with higher BMI in Western populations, further research, using more comprehensive measures of body satisfaction should explore the extent to which Māori may find the Western "thin ideal" personally desirable for their own bodies.