The Use of Animals in Higher Education: Problems, Alternatives, & Recommendations

Authors

Jonathan Balcombe, The Humane Society of the United StatesFollow

Files

Abstract

Despite recent advances in technology and increasing societal concern for animals, animals continue to be exploited and killed in large numbers so that students can learn about their structure and function. Dissection may not be without its merits from an educational standpoint, if well implemented, but it appears from student surveys that it usually is not. When one considers the associated costs—animal suffering and death in the supply trade, disruption of wild animal populations, messages that tend to undermine rather than reinforce respect for life and concern for others, rising costs of animal carcasses (as compared with alternatives with longer shelf lives), exposure to potentially harmful chemicals, and greater time expenditures in preparing and presenting various animal-based exercises—the balance clearly falls on the side of abandoning dissection, at least in its current form.

ISBN

0965894215

Publication Date

2000

Publisher

Humane Society Press

City

Washington, DC

Keywords

animal experimentation, dissection, zoology, animal welfare, ethics, animal testing alternatives

Disciplines

Animal Experimentation and Research | Animal Sciences | Humane Education | Zoology

Recommended Citation

Balcombe, Jonathan, "The Use of Animals in Higher Education: Problems, Alternatives, & Recommendations" (2000). eBooks. 6.
https://www.wellbeingintlstudiesrepository.org/ebooks/6