About the Centre
The Animal Welfare Evidence Centre is a partnership between the RSPCA and three founding partners – Compassion in World Farming, FOUR PAWS UK and Humane World for Animals UK. Together, we bring together academic expertise, policy insight and sector partners to deliver impactful, policy-relevant research.
Our origins
The Centre was founded in 2025 thanks to the generosity of a transformational gift from the Katherine Martin Charitable Trust. It was created to generate and share knowledge and evidence on human attitudes, behaviours and systems that have a bearing on animal welfare.
Our aims
The Centre aims to fill significant evidence gaps in the animal welfare sector, which currently lacks the robust research, insight and evidence common in other preventative fields, such as public health and smoking.
We will focus research on the causes of human harm towards animals, and work collaboratively with partners within and without the animal welfare field to drive long-term change.
The Centre doesn’t take an advocacy or campaigning role. Instead, it produces robust evidence for others to take forward, pushing for and developing better intervention strategies.
Our objectives
We follow an expert-led and evidence-based approach to fulfilling our objectives.
to improve the welfare of animals
To understand the causes of harm to animals and how to prevent it.
Understand attitudes and cultural norms
To deepen the understanding of how public, popular, media, and political beliefs shape human-animal relationships and behaviour.
Foster sector collaboration
To convene animal welfare organisations and partners from other fields to build a robust, shared evidence base that supports more informed decision-making across the sector.
Apply a systemic lens
To situate animal welfare within the broader socio-economic and policy landscape (for example, housing, health, and the economy) to demonstrate its interconnectedness with other social goals.
Inform policy and practice
To provide independent, actionable data to help other organisations influence government policy, legislation, and public engagement, without the Centre pursuing advocacy directly.
Our governance
The Centre is hosted by the RSPCA and operates under an independent, voluntary Advisory Board, which advises, challenges, supports and scrutinises the delivery of the Centre’s research programme, and upholds the quality of its output.
The RSPCA works together with its three other founding partners to ensure the Centre’s research is collaborative, transparent and impactful.
