The Mouse Exchange. What can curiosity-driven public engagement activities contribute to dialogues about animal research?
The Mouse Exchange. What can curiosity-driven public engagement activities contribute to dialogues about animal research?
Despite efforts by the industry to be more open about the use of animals in research, opportunities for the public to learn about this are limited by the traditional public engagement format, which typically follows a knowledge-deficit approach. Coupled with barriers around public willingness to learn about something that stirs up complex feelings, there is a need to develop new public engagement activities that allow for open, nuanced, curiosity-driven explorations of animal research. The Mouse Exchange (MX) achieves this by allowing participants to feel in control of their experience, and to explore the hesitancy, distrust, suspicion, anxieties, and guilt that some associate with animal research. The MX approaches openness via focusing on the making and supply of animals used in research, rather than on the experiment itself. The MX has no script, but rather creates a space where participants converse and craft, becoming curious, creative, and imaginative about the topic as a research mouse, stitched together from felt fabric, forms in their hands. Through this process of crafting, an attachment can form between maker and mouse that gives participants a different stake in animal research. We argue that the MX offers a new, valuable approach to engaging publics in discussions around animal research.
329-351
Manchester University Press
Roe, Emma
f7579e4e-3721-4046-a2d4-d6395f61c675
Peres, Sara
d6b4ed3e-254d-4ff8-943b-4cc518caa20d
Crudgington, Bentley
8379c7c0-3ed4-42c8-86f7-6653286b37a5
9 January 2024
Roe, Emma
f7579e4e-3721-4046-a2d4-d6395f61c675
Peres, Sara
d6b4ed3e-254d-4ff8-943b-4cc518caa20d
Crudgington, Bentley
8379c7c0-3ed4-42c8-86f7-6653286b37a5
Roe, Emma, Peres, Sara and Crudgington, Bentley
(2024)
The Mouse Exchange. What can curiosity-driven public engagement activities contribute to dialogues about animal research?
In,
Davies, Gail, Greenhough, Beth, Hobson-West, Pru, Kirk, Robert G.W., Palmer, Alexandra and Roe, Emma
(eds.)
Researching animal research: What the humanities and social sciences can contribute to laboratory animal science and welfare.
Manchester University Press, .
(doi:10.7765/9781526165770.00024).
Record type:
Book Section
Abstract
Despite efforts by the industry to be more open about the use of animals in research, opportunities for the public to learn about this are limited by the traditional public engagement format, which typically follows a knowledge-deficit approach. Coupled with barriers around public willingness to learn about something that stirs up complex feelings, there is a need to develop new public engagement activities that allow for open, nuanced, curiosity-driven explorations of animal research. The Mouse Exchange (MX) achieves this by allowing participants to feel in control of their experience, and to explore the hesitancy, distrust, suspicion, anxieties, and guilt that some associate with animal research. The MX approaches openness via focusing on the making and supply of animals used in research, rather than on the experiment itself. The MX has no script, but rather creates a space where participants converse and craft, becoming curious, creative, and imaginative about the topic as a research mouse, stitched together from felt fabric, forms in their hands. Through this process of crafting, an attachment can form between maker and mouse that gives participants a different stake in animal research. We argue that the MX offers a new, valuable approach to engaging publics in discussions around animal research.
Text
9781526165770-9781526165770.00024
- Version of Record
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Published date: 9 January 2024
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 487688
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/487688
PURE UUID: ee9ba50c-017c-4dc6-bdad-3891c18aec29
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Date deposited: 01 Mar 2024 17:32
Last modified: 25 Jul 2024 01:41
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Contributors
Author:
Bentley Crudgington
Editor:
Gail Davies
Editor:
Beth Greenhough
Editor:
Pru Hobson-West
Editor:
Robert G.W. Kirk
Editor:
Alexandra Palmer
Editor:
Emma Roe
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