This page provides instructions for advocates to view and filter the results of HRC's Animal Tracker annual survey in graphical form. If you find this tool useful in your work for animals, please donate to HRC to help us keep it updated. Note: To use the graphing tool, you must be a registered user of HumaneSpot.org (which is entirely free). Please go here to register.

The graphing tool is a powerful way to visualize public opinion and behavior data relating to animals. To get started quickly, use the Basic Instructions below. To explore the graphing tool’s full capabilities, see the Detailed Instructions.

Basic Instructions
Detailed Instructions
Questions or Problems
About the Animal Tracker
Glossary of Terms

Basic Instructions

1. Click here to open the graphing tool in a new window.
2. Using the chart on the left, select the “Year” and question that interests you from the drop-down menus. Note that the question sets differ by year.
3. To view demographic differences, select a variable from the “Filter by Demographic” drop-down menu. Then refine your filter using the new drop-down menu that appears for that demographic variable.
4. To compare with another demographic variable, follow steps 2 and 3 using the chart on the right and select a different demographic filter.
5. To compare questions between years, select “Year 1 (2008)” from the drop-down menu on the left chart and choose your question. Select a different year on the right chart and choose the same question for comparison.

Once your choices have been made, the graphs will automatically update. The question and answer key will be visible at the top of the graph, below the drop-down menus. The numbers at the top of each column in the chart is the percentage of survey respondents selecting that answer.

EXAMPLE

To see how women feel about the animal advocacy movement’s impact compared with men, first select Year 3 (2010) and the question “Regardless of your personal opinion about the animal protection movement, how much of an impact do you think it has had on our nation's policies?” Do this for both the left and right charts.

On the left chart, select “Sex” under the “Filter by Demographic” drop-down menu, and then select “Female.” On the right chart, select “Sex” under the “Filter by Demographic” drop-down menu, and then select “Male” instead. The result is a chart showing female respondents only and another showing males only, providing a quick visual comparison.

Detailed Instructions

Detailed instructions for using the Animal Tracker graphing tool depend on what specifically you’d like to do:

View results of a single question
Compare results from year to year
Compare results by demographic traits

View results of a single question

If you are interested in viewing the results of a single question you will only need to use one graph.

1. Choose which year is of interest to you. There is a set of drop-down menus at the top of each graph. Locate the drop-down menu labeled “Year 1 (2008).” Click on the arrow on the right side of this box to make the menu options appear. Place the cursor over your choice and click on it to make your selection. Year 1 is the default category so if this is the year in which you are interested, and you have not previously changed this field in another analysis, you may skip this step.
2. Select the question that is of interest to you. Locate the drop-down menu labeled “Select Question.” Click on the arrow on the right side of the box to make the menu options appear. Place the cursor over your choice and click on it to make your selection. The list of questions that appears will depend on which year you have selected. All questions were asked in Year 1; different subsets of these questions were asked again in subsequent years.

OPTIONAL

Follow steps 3 and 4 if you wish to refine the results by demographic characteristics.

There is text at the top of the graph that says: “Filter by demographic.” Next to the text is a drop-down menu labeled “None.” If you do not wish to refine your search leave this field on “None.”

3. Filter the results by a specific demographic category. If you do wish to view results for specific sub-groups of respondents, click on the arrow in the right side of that box to make the menu options appear. Place the cursor over your choice and click on it to make your selection. This will indicate which demographic category you are interested in filtering by.
4. Refine your demographic results by selecting a demographic sub-group. After you select a demographic category, an additional drop-down menu appears on the right. This will allow you to select which group within this demographic category you want to examine. Click on the arrow in the right side of that box to make the menu options appear. Place the cursor over your choice and click on it to make your selection.

The charts will update automatically to reflect the demographic group you selected.

Compare results from year to year

If you are interested in comparing results by year you will need to use both graphs simultaneously. The left-hand graph with the blue bars is referred to as “graph 1” and the right-hand graph with the orange bars is referred to as “graph 2.”

Note: As of May 2012, five survey waves have been completed.

1. Select Year 1 on graph 1. Set the graph on the left to “Year 1 (2008)” by following the directions in step 1 in the section above.
2. Select Question and Demographic filter on graph 1. Follow steps 2 and 3 in the section above to select the question in which you are interested and to refine your results by demographics, if desired.
3. Select Year for graph 2. Determine whether the question that you want to compare was asked in 2009 or 2010. Follow step 1 in the previous section to select this year for the graph on the right-hand side.
4. Select question filter on graph 2. Follow step 2 in the section above to select the question in which you are interested.
5. Optional: Select demographic filters on graph 2. If refining your results by demographic follow steps 3 and 4 from the section above as well.
6. Double check that the question and demographic selections on both graphs are identical before comparing your results by year.

Each chart will update automatically to reflect the waves, questions, and demographic filters that you select.

Compare results by demographic traits

If you are interested in comparing results by demographic characteristics you will need to use both graphs simultaneously. The left-hand graph with the blue bars is referred to as “graph 1” and the right-hand graph with the orange bars as referred to as “graph 2.”

1. Select year and question on graph 1. Follow steps 1 and 2 in the first section under Detailed Instructions above to select the year and question in which you are interested for the left-hand graph.
2. Select year and question on graph 2. Follow steps 1 and 2 in the first section above to select the same wave and question on the right-hand graph.
3. Double check that the year and question selections on both graphs are identical.
4. Decide which category of demographics you are interested in comparing on graphs 1 and 2. Follow step 3 in the first section above to select this category on graph 1. Repeat for graph 2.
5. Double check that the demographic category on both graphs is identical.
6. Select the demographic sub-group for graph 1. On the left-hand graph, follow step 4 in the first section above to select a sub-group within the demographic category you chose.
7. Select the demographic sub-group for graph 2. On the right-hand graph, follow step 4 in the first section above to select the sub-group within the demographic category that you would like to compare to the sub-group you chose in graph 1.

Questions or Problems

If you experience any technical issues or other problems accessing the Animal Tracker graphing tool, or if you have suggestions for improvement, please contact HRC and explain your problem or suggestion in detail. We will respond within five business days.

About the Animal Tracker

HRC's Animal Tracker is an annual survey of key issues related to animals and animal advocates. The inaugural wave, sponsored by a consortium of animal protection organizations, was completed in June 2008. The second wave was completed in March 2009 and the third wave was completed in March 2010. Go here for complete results and analysis of the Animal Tracker surveys, please visit this page.

The Animal Tracker graphing tool was generously developed by Mark Middleton of Animal Visuals, a website that provides compelling visuals and interactive media to empower animal advocates, educate the public, and expose the injustices of animal exploitation.

Glossary of Terms

What are the Questions?

The Animal Tracker survey asks respondents questions regarding their attitudes toward issues that affect animals and animal advocates. In total there are 16 questions. Most of these have multiple parts as the same question is asked for a number of different issues, or stems. For example, one question in the survey is “How knowledgeable do you feel about issues that affect the welfare of animals in the following circumstances?” This question was asked for a number of issues, including animals in circuses and rodeos, animals in laboratories, animals raised for food, and endangered species, among others. When you select a question using the graphing tool, results for all elements of the question will be shown in the resulting chart. All questions were asked in 2008 and different subsets of these questions were asked again in 2009 and 2010.

What are “Demographics”?

Demographics are characteristics of an individual or population. In this case demographics refer to characteristics of survey respondents. These include: age, education, ethnicity, sex, region of the country in which one lives, and whether a respondent has a companion animal(s) in his or her household. You can filter your charts by these characteristics. “Sub-groups” refer to any demographically defined subset of the population, such as people age 30-44 or people with some college education.