*4.1. Visibility*

Transport was a key area of concern when participants described their perceptions of red meat consumption. Transport may be of greater concern to the general public than other practices affecting farm animal welfare, for example painful practices in animal care and production, because transport is

highly visible to the public, due to livestock trucks passing regularly through urban areas. Participants (in Adelaide and Toowoomba in particular) mentioned seeing trucks in their neighbourhoods and on main roads. For many in urban areas, the only occasion on which they see meat producing animals may well be during transport. Areas of beef cattle and sheep meat production are often remote from urban areas, but in smaller cities the rationalisation of the meat processing sector means that animals may need to be transported from one side of the city to the other, with the shortest route being through urban areas.

In addition to the first-hand observations of animals in trucks in urban areas, the live export industry has frequently been covered in the Australia press in recent years [45,46] following on from exposés revealing abuse in destination countries, appalling conditions during transport, and continued breaches of industry standards. It should be noted that we are not suggesting that the media coverage of live export is influencing public perceptions more generally of transportation, only that the issue of animal transport has been prominent in public discourse in Australia in recent years via the live export debates. The perceptions of live export expressed by the participants in this study are consistent with those documented in other scholarship [27,30] and include "disgust", outrage, and calls for the trade to be discontinued, as we discuss in more detail below.

#### *4.2. The Role of Anthropomorphism*

Concerns expressed in the current study about animals being tightly packed into trucks or ships may result from participants projecting their emotions onto the animals based on the participants' own experiences in crowded situations. Crowding is a subjective psychological response to density and refers to situations which result in feelings of restriction within the individuals exposed to limited or tight spaces [47,48]. In relation to human population density, different cultures have different levels of adaptation and tolerance to crowding [48]. Tolerance of crowding is related to socioeconomic background, age, education, culture, and previous living environments. People who have previously lived in a high density, crowded environment are less likely to feel crowded than someone who lives in a more spacious environment [48–50]. In Australia, we have relatively low population density relative to other countries; however, Australians are still likely to have experienced situations of crowding, such as at a sporting event or music concert and thus can still imagine discomfort at being crowded or "crammed" into a small space. Long distance transport could be viewed in the same way: Many people do not like to travel in tight spaces, such as planes or cars, for long periods or distances. In short, concern about the density at which animals are loaded for transportation may be reflections of the participants' own feelings about crowding and confinement.

#### *4.3. What about Disgust and Moral Outrage?*

Participants frequently described their perceptions of livestock transport as 'disgusting'. Several authors have suggested links between disgust and moral outrage [51–54]. Disgust is considered to be a moral emotion [55] and a "gut feeling" [56], which is provoked by something, or the thought of something, violating the purity of the body or soul [57]. The feeling of disgust has previously been identified as resulting from imagery of animals raised under 'cruel' factory farming conditions [17,18]. Some authors sugges<sup>t</sup> that people find things more immoral when they are exposed to disgust cues (such as the presence of contaminants, for example faeces) [56]. Therefore, it may be that the current study's participants found what they viewed as the crowded and potentially unsanitary conditions experienced by animals during transport to be disgusting and hence morally problematic. This disgust may also be connected to the idea that these animals will eventually be consumed, as disgust often arises in connection to issues relating to food consumption [58–60]. Alternatively, participants may have found the treatment of animals during transport to be morally problematic (because it is "cruel") and hence "disgusting". It is difficult to disentangle these concepts or to definitively determine the causality between them, given their tight relationship in our participants' responses.

#### *4.4. The Connection of Transport to Slaughter*

The visibility of animals in trucks (or on ships in the media or in person) may serve as a reminder that animals are killed to produce meat and hence may reinforce the meat-animal connection, which may be distressing even for meat consumers. In Australia, meat is typically purchased from the supermarket or a butcher's shop in pre-packaged forms and generally lacks much resemblance to the live animal that it once was [61,62]. Disguising the animal characteristics of meat by removing prompts, such as the head, feet, and skin, removes the associated personality and intelligence of the living animal, which further enables the de-animalising process [63]. Supermarkets have contributed to this process by presenting ready-cooked meat in packages, which makes the original animal even more distant from products with uncooked animal flesh, which arguably has more transparency with regard to its origins [64]. The distinction between the animal and meat produced from it is further complicated through creation of semantic differences particularly in English, which eliminates animal designators, such as cow and sheep, by substituting terms, such as beef and lamb in the context of consumption [63]. Such differentiation reinforces the de-animalising process, which allows consumers to generate mental distinctions between the living animal and meat product, and hence detach the one from the other. As Leroy and Praet [65] describe, even with an increasing level of moral aversion toward animal killing, those in modern societies are still fond of consuming meat, though they are experiencing increasing levels of ambivalence.

#### *4.5. Genuine Concern for the Welfare of Animals*

Negative emotions toward livestock transport highlighted in the current study appear to be related to animals being "crammed" into trailers or ships, which participants felt was cruel and inhumane. Australia has one of the highest rates of pet ownership globally, with 62 percent of households owning pets [66]. Many Australian families have become "more-than-human" [67] with a higher proportion of Australians living with a dog and/or cat than with a child [68]. Alongside the increase in pet ownership, there has been an incredible economic rise in the pet industry, with Australian households spending more than \$12.2 billion annually on pet products and services, representing an increase of 42 percent from 2013 to 2016 [69].

Australians' increasing concerns about farm animal welfare can also be seen in the response to recent activists' campaigns about caged hens [70] and the live export issue [17,28]. In activist campaign videos, animals are often represented as individuals (frequently with names and personalities) who are suffering. The activist organisation Animals Australia has been at the forefront of broadcasting moments of "extreme cruelty experienced by these animals in their last moments" in both domestic and overseas abattoirs with such footage described as "effective enough in mobilising Australians for abattoirs to be shut down ... and the installation of surveillance cameras in abattoirs" [17] (p. 45), as well as the suspension of live export trade [28]. Despite evidence which suggests that Australian meat consumers typically ignore animal welfare activism, particularly when it is online [38], it is clear that animal welfare activism has played a significant role in raising general awareness and communicating to the public about intensive animal agriculture and the live export controversy.

In the case of live export in particular, many Australians wish to see the trade end [27]. As live export has been a long-standing and ongoing point of contention in Australia, it is unsurprising that it was raised as an issue associated with animal welfare by participants in the current study. Many participants stated that the trade is disgusting and unnecessary, as processing the livestock in Australia and exporting the frozen meat was considered to be more likely to be beneficial to the Australian workforce and economy than are current practices associated exporting the live animal. However, it is unclear whether such an approach would be viable, given that Australia's main export markets require halal slaughter and limited time between slaughter and consumption, and also often do not have extensive refrigeration networks.

#### *4.6. Transport Workers are Not Trusted*

Although farmers are generally trusted in Australia to care for the welfare of their animals [71,72], this trust is not extended to those who transport animals. Coleman et al. [73] have demonstrated that 24 percent of the general public in Australia have low trust in workers involved in land-based livestock transport, and 41 percent indicated to have low trust in workers involved in livestock transport by sea. Similar results were found in the current study, with participants often suggesting those involved between the farm gate and the processing plant (i.e., the livestock transporters) are of most concern. Given these public concerns, the industry may need to consider ways to limit or eliminate long distance truck transport by opening, or in the case of Australia re-opening, smaller more localised processing facilities or utilising mobile abattoirs [2]. However, these options may be unrealistic based on the efficiencies obtained by utilising larger processing plants, as well as the high cost of livestock processing in Australia.
