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THE REPORT

OTHER STUDIES

BACKGROUND

THE FURRY SOCIOLOGICAL SURVEY
(Evans, 2008)

Introduction

This report is focusing on a worldwide community known as furries. But what is a furry? In the most general of terms, a furry is person who expresses “an interest in anthropomorphic animals or creatures.” ("Furry" in WikiFur, 2007, para. 2) There are unending and undefined subtleties about what makes a furry, but the purpose of this study is not to define furry, but to analyse the various qualities of furries as a whole.

In 2001, David J. Rust published The Sociology of Furry Fandom. It was a study of 360 furries and gathered census data on gender, education, age, occupation and more. The results of Rust’s study provided evidence for elements of furry which had previously only been assumed. For example, while furries were aware that the community was predominately male, Rust’s study was able to say that 85% of furries were male and 15% were female. Conversely, Rust’s study also brought ideas which were generally accepted to be true into question. For example, it is a popular idea that furries are predominately homosexual. However, Rust’s study found only 18% of participants were homosexual, with bisexuality (48%) being dominant.

Rust’s results are now many years old and were focused primarily on American furry conventions (325 surveys were conducted in person and 25 were conducted online) and so the data that Rust found is in need of validation. This is where the present study comes in. While Rust focused on convention attending furries, this study has chosen to focus exclusively on furries found online on forums and message boards. By doing so, the study is (theoretically) able to reach a worldwide audience. We are also able to compare our findings about message board and forum dwelling furries with that of the convention attending furries surveyed by Rust. Keep in mind that furries may both attend conventions as well as going onto online forums or messages boards.

In addition to comparing our findings with Rust’s we will also compare our results with that of three other recent studies of the furry fandom; Furries from A to Z: Anthropomorphism to Zoomorphism (Gerbasi, 2007), Furries Are People Too: Social and Cognitive Factors in Unique Social Communities (Rossmassler & Wen, 2007) and State of the Fandom (Osaki, 2008).

Gerbasi’s (2007) study focused more on the personality traits and trends of furries, surveying 217 furry participants and 29 non-furry participants who were attending Anthrocon; a large American furry convention. We will be looking solely at the findings of the furry participants of Gerbasi’s study. The study by Rossmassler and Wen (2007) mirrors the present study and Rust’s study more closely in that it also looks at general statistics of furries, such as gender and occupation. Their study surveyed over 600 participants using an online survey. Lastly, Osaki’s (2008) survey is an online poll which continues to remain open and is constantly accepting new data. Osaki’s results referenced in this report are from September 10th, 2008. At the time the survey had been completed by 6093 furry participants.

However, it is Rust’s study that is the focus of our attention. By replicating Rust’s survey and studying a different section of the furry community, we should be able to identify which elements of furry appear to be universal, which elements fluctuate and why that is.

Method

Participants
The participants in this study were 276 people who self-identified themselves as being furries. All the participants in this study were from furry or furry-related message boards and forums. These were the forums on Furtopia, Fur Affinity, Planet Furry, VCL, the Furry Broadcasting Corporation, the Furry Army of Doom, the Jack forums, the Ozy & Millie forums, the Dan & Mab’s Furry Adventures forums, the Wikifur message boards and the Alt.Fan.Furry message boards. These places were all chosen because they have no particular focus on specific elements of furry.  For example, the Yiffstar forums were avoided, as they focus on the ‘adult’ side of furry; Yiffstar being a website largely dedicated to furry erotica. Likewise, the Yerf forums were avoided because they focus on the ‘clean’ side of furry; the now defunct Yerf website allowed art only up to a PG rating. Participants from either of these forums might have skewed the results relating to questions about sexuality. In our sample there were 47 females, 225 males and 4 who fell in the ‘other’ category of gender. Participation was voluntary and consent was indicated by marking an X at the end of the statement of consent section of the survey. The marking of an X was an instruction given right at the end of the statement of consent so that participants would likely have to read the statement properly and so understand their rights as participants.

Materials 
All participants completed an online survey of sixteen questions. The survey was modeled on the original survey conducted by Rust (2001). Some questions asked by Rust were not included (for example, the question regarding city size), while others were modified to suit an international audience. For example, Rust’s question regarding residence had options for parts of America, Canada and Europe, while the present study broke up residence into continents. Questions were also added, namely the questions regarding sexual interest in furry, diet and years spent actively taking part in the furry fandom. Some questions, such as the question regarding occupation, also had extra categories added; namely hospitality and emergency services. Lastly, Rust asked a question regarding city size which we chose not to include in this survey.

Procedure
Posts were made on several furry and furry-related message boards and forums outlining the study and asking for people to take part in the online survey. The survey was downloaded by participants, who then marked their responses by typing in an X next to their desired answers. After completing all sixteen questions, participants emailed their surveys in. The tally was done manually twice over to ensure the results were correct. The callout for participants began on November 24, 2006 and the survey finished collecting responses on April 30, 2007.

Click here to download a PDF of the survey.

Click here to be taken to a page listing the original posts calling for participants.

Results

Question 1: What is your gender?


Question 2: What is your age?

Question 3: What is your current continent of residence?
 

Question 4: What is your race?
 

Question 5: What is your current martial status?
 

Question 6: What is your sexual orientation?
 

Question 7: What is your sexual inclination?
 

Question 8: Is your interest in furry of a sexual or non-sexual nature?
 

Question 9: Are you a zoophile?
 

Question 10: Are you a plushophile?

 
Question 11: What is your religion?
 


 

Question 12: What is your current education or highest level achieved?
 

Question 13: What is your primary occupation?
 

Question 14: What is your yearly income?
 

Question 15: What is your diet?
 

Question 16: How long have you been actively involved in the furry fandom?

Discussion

Question 2: Age
For the question regarding age, the present study had a wider age bracket than Rust’s (2001) original study. Rust’s age bracket ranged from 16 to 50, while our age bracket ranged from 13 to above 80. However, we had no participants that were older than 60. When comparing the distribution pattern of both studies, they are markedly different in nature. While Rust found that the majority (78%) of furries were aged 18 to 35, we found slightly less (67.5%) in the same age bracket. The majority of our participants (76.5%) were in the 13 to 22 age bracket. Meanwhile Osaki (2008), who also conducted his study via an online survey, found 90.6% of participants to be aged 15 to 34. This difference in age distribution is possibly due to each studies different focus on furry sub-groups; Rust’s Rust’s convention furries, Osaki’s sample of online furries at large and our furries on online message boards and forums. It appears that the convention attending furry of Rust’s study tend to be slightly older than those found online. An older furry would have a greater independence, travel options and finances that would enable them to attend conventions, whereas a younger furry would not have the same strength of resources to attend a convention. It would appear that in general, furries are young. But just what exactly is the typical age bracket has yet to be conclusively determined.

Question 3: Continent of residence
Looking at the worldwide distribution of furries we found that the majority of participants reside in North America (78%). The second most furry-populated continent was Europe with 15%, followed by Australia with 5%. Note that the survey was only available in English, which limits access to those who can read English. It is assumed that the worldwide furry presence is more evenly spread out than recorded here. Rossmassler and Wen (2007) also found that the majority of furries (83%) resided in America. But their study was also victim to the same English speaking bias. Likewise Osaki’s (2008) study had the same bias, but yielded similar results with the majority of participants being from the United States (68.9%), with Australian participants (3.5%) being the fourth most furry populated country according to their results. Given that the most popular furry conventions, such as Anthrocon and Further Confusion are all in North America, it may well be that North America is indeed the continent most populated by furries. However, we have yet to accurately determine the worldwide distribution of furries. To do this would require a survey available in multiple languages. For the time being, we can state conclusively that amongst furries who have the ability to speak and/or read English, the vast majority are American.

Question 4: Race
Much like gender, our results for race are remarkably similar to Rust’s (2001) findings. Firstly, both studies found a similarly low number of black (2% in Rust, 2.5% in the present study) and Hispanic (1% in Rust, 3% in the present study) participants. Rust’s study also found that 94% of participants were white and the present study found 87.5%. Following this trend, Rossmassler and Wen (2007) also found that 89% of their participants were white. In addition, Osaki’s (2008) results are almost exactly the same as ours, with 1.3% African, 83.4% Caucasian, 4.3% Hispanic, 2.9% Asian and 6.1% of another ethnicity. Osaki’s results completely validate our own findings. Note that both Rust and Osaki’s study had the addition of Native American as a response option and that both studies found 2% of participants of this ethnicity. While the English speaking bias of these studies would have undoubtedly effected the results, it is obvious that the vast majority of furries are Caucasian.

Question 5: Relationship status
While the results for both studies have a similar downward trend (with the exception of the ‘never dated’ category) the findings of the two studies are markedly different. Rust (2001) found just 1% of participants reported to never have dated, while we found 18%. This is likely to be due to the 25% of furry participants in the present study aged 13-17 who may well have not yet entered the dating world. Rust’s study may also have been skewed by a social desirability bias in regards to participants answering that they have never dated. A social desirability bias is “a tendency to give socially approved answers to questions about oneself.” (Weiten 2005) Specifically, participants in Rust’s study may not have wished to appear as though they were inexperienced at dating and answered untruthfully. Our study may possibly have been affected by the same bias, although we have the advantage of the anonymity of the Internet, which reduces this possibility. In addition, we found that the number of those in a relationship was significantly lower than the number found in Rust’s study; 27% as compared with 57%. We can conclude then that convention attending furries are more likely to be in a relationship than forum or message board dwelling furries. In both studies, a significant portion of furries were single; 55% in the present study; 42% in Rust’s study. On another note, this question doesn’t really take into account online dating. Future studies should investigate those furries who date online as there are a great number of them, as evidenced by the more than ten thousand members at Pounced.org; an online dating website for furries.

Question 6: Sexual orientation
The pattern of distribution of sexual orientation amongst furries that we found was very different from what Rust (2001) had previously found. While Rust found bisexuality to be the dominant orientation (48%), the present study finds heterosexuality dominant (39%). Interestingly, the percentage of homosexuals is very similar in both studies; 14% in the present study and 18% for Rust’s study. Meanwhile, Rossmassler and Wen (2007), Osaki (2008) and Gerbasi (2007) all found a more even distribution of sexual orientation. Rossmassler and Wen’s study found 32.7% of participants were heterosexual, 37.3% were bisexual, 25.5% were homosexual and 8% listed ‘other’ as their sexuality. Similarly, Osaki reported 32.8% of participants were heterosexual, 36.2% were bisexual, 23% were homosexual and 8.1% listed ‘other’ or 'neither' as their sexuality. Likewise, Gerbasi’s participants were 28.1% heterosexual, 35.94% bisexual and 31.54% homosexual. Note that Gerbasi separated her results of sexual orientation for gender, finding a similar amount of both bisexual male and female furries (40.5% and 41.1% respectively) but finding not one homosexual female in her entire sample - furry or otherwise. Note also that both Osaki and Rossmassler and Wen conducted their studies online. Those three agreeable studies were all conducted several years after Rust’s study, so the difference in Rust’s findings regarding sexual orientation could well reflect a change in the composition of the members of the furry fandom since 2001. Meanwhile, as Rossmassler and Wen and Osaki both sampled from the online furry community at large, the slight disparity of our findings may indicate small differences in the sexual orientation of furries found on online forums and message boards. While the exact ratio of sexual orientation within the furry fandom has yet to be determined, we can state definitively that there are significant numbers of heterosexuals, bisexuals, homosexuals and those with other sexualities. The findings of Osaki, Gerbasi and Rossmassler and Wen all indicate that this distribution may be more evenly balanced that previously assumed. Future studies might wish to implement a Kinsey style scale, rather than fixed categories. The Kinsey scale assigns the numbers 0 through to 6 to indicate exclusively heterosexual through to exclusively homosexual, with an additional category being added for asexuality; a category which the present study admittedly failed to include (Kinsey, 1948).

Question 7: Sexual inclination
There is an obvious disparity in the trends of both studies regarding sexual inclination. It may be that convention attending furries may have different sexual inclinations than forum and message board attending furries. Note that there was a mistake in writing of the question for present study’s survey, as it includes the option of polyandrous, but omits polygynous as an option.  It may be advisable to leave this question out of future studies or to attend to it more thoroughly. At the moment, the data for this question is not substantial enough to draw any conclusions.

Question 8: Sexual interest in furry
The presence of sexuality within the furry fandom can be a sensitive issue. The furry community celebrates anthropomorphism in a variety of ways, including (but not limited to) the creation and appreciation of art, literature and costuming. These furry creations (and more) can be made in a myriad of styles for a myriad of purposes, including for erotic or pornographic purposes. One may question if furry is a fandom first and a fetish second, or vice versa. Looking at popular furry art galleries VCL and Fur Affinity, one can easily find both pornographic and non-sexual anthropomorphic art in large quantities. The question we are exploring at this moment is how sexually orientated is the furry community? Our results show that 79% of furries on forums and message boards have some degree of sexual interest in furry. We found that furries with a minor sexual interest in furry were most common, with 46% of participants selecting this response. Then there were 33% who said that they had a significantly sexual interest in furry. Lastly 21% said their interest in furry was not sexual at all. Interestingly, out of 276 participants, not one said that their interest in furry was totally sexual. However, Osaki (2008) found significantly different results. His results found 16.9% reported that sex played an extremely large or large part in their furry lives – approximately half the number found in the present study. In addition, 31.6% reported a medium degree of sex in their furry lives and 51.4% reported a small or extremely small degree. Though Osaki and the present study gave different response options (and Osaki had no option to say that sex played no part in their furry lives), this cannot be sole reason for the differences in the findings. However, this disparity could be accounted for by the wording of the two questions. We worded the question: “is your interest in furry of a sexual or non-sexual nature?” Whereas Osaki asked: “to what degree does sex play a part in your furry life?” Osaki’s wording implies that it is asking about sex acts in the real world, such as having sexual intercourse whilst wearing a fursuit; a full body anthropomorphic animal costume. Our wording implies a more general interest in anthropomorphic animals for sexual reasons, such as arousal from erotic anthropomorphic animal art. While this question merits further investigation, we can at least conclude that while it appears that the online furry community does have an undeniably strong base in sexuality, there is a significant portion of furries who have little or no sexual interest in furry. On average, we (humans) are sexual beings by nature and so it’s a matter of honesty to one’s self that there is some sexual component to furry (however it may be related) due to the versatile nature of the subject matter. Additionally, it is also valid to have an interest in anthropomorphism that does not include a sexual component. In general, we can say that furry is not wholly sexual in attraction. It is a strong element of furry, but it is not the entirety of furry. Future studies may wish to ask participants what specific behaviours are associated with their sexual interest, if any.

Question 9 & 10: Zoophilia and plushophilia
The numbers of participants who were zoophiles and plushophiles was significantly higher in the current study than those found in Rust’s (2001) original survey. Rust found 2% of participants to be zoophiles, while we found 17%. Likewise, Rust found 0.3% to be plushophiles and we found 7%. Meanwhile Osaki (2008) – who also conducted his survey online – found results remarkably similar to our own findings, with 17.2% of participants being zoophiles and 8.4% being plushophiles. Given that the majority of Rust’s survey was conducted in person at conventions, participants were susceptible to the social desirability bias when it came to zoophilia and plushophilia. In the present study and Osaki’s, the anonymity of internet means participants would hold little reservation about answering truthfully and so it seems that the findings of the present study and Osaki’s seem to be accurate - at least for the online furry community. Interestingly, Osaki also asked participants about their general response to both zoophilia and plushophilia. Regarding zoophilia, 18.1% of participants responded positively or extremely positively towards zoophilia, 36.8% were ambivalent and the majority (45.1%) responded negatively or extremely negatively. As for regarding plushophilia, 17.7% of Osaki’s participants were positive, or extremely positive towards it, 55.1% were ambivalent and 27.2% responded negatively or extremely negatively. Given almost identical numbers of zoophiles and those who responded positively or extremely positively towards zoophilia (17.2% and 18.1% respectively), we may assume that the vast majority of participants who responded positively are zoophiles themselves. Meanwhile, what we assume to be the non-zoophile participants in Osaki’s study are split between ambivalence and disapproval. Additionally, Osaki’s results indicate the fandom is generally far less condemning of plushophiles than it is of zoophilia. It is queer to report that within the online furry community the likelihood of finding a female furry is only slightly higher than the likelihood of finding a zoophile. All the same, 82.8 to 83% of furries found online are not zoophiles. It would be interesting for future studies to plot the correlation between non-zoophiles and non-plushophiles and their responses to those fetishes.

Question 11: Religion
There was little connection between the findings of our study and Rust’s (2001) study when it came to the question regarding religion. We found a lesser amount of Neo-Pagans (6.5% versus 20%), but a greater number of atheists and Christians (20% atheists and 28.5% Christians versus 10% atheists and 18% Christians). However, the numbers of non-denominational theists, agnostics and those who were undecided were quite similar between both studies. Meanwhile, Osaki’s (2008) findings have a resemblance to our own. Of Osaki’s participants 26.2% were Catholic, Protestant or some from of Christian, 8% were pagan, 23.7% were agnostic, 21.5% were atheist and 20.6% were of another religion. It isn’t immediately apparent whether this disparity in findings between the two online surveys and Rust’s study reflects a difference between convention attending furries and furries found online, a shift in religious attitudes since 2001 or the result of another extraneous variable. At present, all we can tell from this data is that furries hold a variety religious beliefs, most prominent of which appear to be forms of Christianity, atheism, agnosticism or paganism. Other beliefs appear to be poorly represented – however these findings are likely to be at least partially due to the English speaking bias of the present studies. Further research in this area should make the survey available in multiple languages and investigate this possible disparity between furries found at conventions and furries found online.

Question 12: Education
While we found that the majority of furries in both the present survey and Rust’s (2001) survey were presently studying, or had studied up to high school, college or university (87% and 68% respectively), the participants of Rust’s study tended to have a higher level of education than the forum and message board dwelling furries of our study. We found that just 13% of participants had, or were presently studying a bachelor’s degree, master’s degree or PhD, while Rust found 32% in these categories. These results are most likely due to the focus of each study. As already discussed and evidenced by the results, furries attending conventions are typically older than those on message boards and forums - so it follows that the younger furries would not be old enough to yet have achieved a bachelors degree or higher. Osaki (2008) also asked participants about their education level. However, that study used a markedly different category system, so it’s difficult to make too many direct comparisons. Still, Osaki found 31.6% of participant’s highest education level was partial completion or completion of high school and that 22.4% had graduated from college. Future studies should have the specific categories found in this and Rust’s study, but also include Osaki’s idea of asking whether participants had completed their education in order to get a better look at the spread of education levels amongst furries.

Question 13: Occupation
Much like the question concerning religion, the distribution for occupation is just as varied and, for the most part, is unlike Rust’s (2001) results. Osaki (2008) and Rossmassler and Wen (2007) also found differing results. While the numbers vary, student was listed as the primary occupation in the present study (53.2%), Rust’s study (31%), Osaki (45.7%) and Rossmassler and Wen (38%).  Interestingly, the numbers of computer professionals in the present study was less high than in Rust’s study, (9% as compared with 22%) while unemployment was higher in the present study than in Rust’s; 10% versus 3% respectively. This is possibly due to the aforementioned age difference in the sub-groups of furries in the present study and Rust’s study. Like the question regarding education, Osaki used a different set of categories for occupations, so it’s difficult to compare our finds with theirs. However, Osaki did find that 4.9% of participants had no occupation. From this data, we can conclude that the majority of furries are students and that only a small minority of furries are unemployed. Given the vast variety of employment types, this is understandably a difficult question to investigate.

Question 14: Annual Income
While there is a similar downward trend between our results and Rust’s (2001) results of the annual income of furries, the numbers vary greatly. Rust’s study found that 49% of participants earned an annual salary that was below the $20,000 to $30,000 bracket, while our study found that 79.5% of participants who fell into that region. Meanwhile, Rossmassler and Wen (2007) found that nearly 60% of participants had an annual salary of less than $20,000. The lesser percentage of low income earners in Rust’s study could be attributed to Rust’s convention attending participants, who tend to be older and thus are more likely have worked their way up to a higher salary. Not mention that conventions can be expensive to attend. But this theory doesn’t fully explain the range of results found by Osaki (2008), Rossmassler and Wen and the present study – all of which studied furries through online surveys. Yet, Osaki found results comparable to Rust’s findings. Rust found 35% of participants earned less than $10,000 and 50% earned between $10,000 and $50,000. Osaki found 39.8% earned less than $9,999 and 44.8% earned between $10,000 and $44,999. Lastly, Rust found 15% earned more than $50,000 and Osaki found 15.5% earned over $45,000. Though Rust and Osaki used different integers of income which makes exact analysis difficult, their findings appear to validate one another. Considering this, it may well be that the findings of Rust and Osaki most accurately represent the distribution of incomes for furries both online and at conventions. Note that Rossmassler and Wen have not published their complete tally of results, so we cannot compare all of their findings for this question. This question needs further investigation to be properly validated, but it can be said that, in general, furries tend to be low income earners.

Question 15: Diet
The vast majority of participants (92.%) identified themselves as being omnivorous. Curiously, there were nearly as many vegans and vegetarians (4%) as there were carnivores (4.3%). Similarly, 4.8% of participants in Osaki’s (2008) study were vegetarian – though Osaki did not ask if participants were vegan or carnivorous. It’s interesting that participants identified as being carnivores, as this diet is not one well documented amongst humans. While much is written on vegetarian and vegan diets, both of which are sufficiently healthy for human beings if practiced properly (Winick, 1980), there is little knowledge or research into humans ability to gain adequate nutrition from a meat only diet. Although Sabaté (2001) argues that the risk of nutritional deficiency is far greater in a meat-based diet than for a vegetarian diet, my research has found no studies of humans on carnivorous diets. It may well be that some participants answered carnivore simply because they preferred meat-based meals, but were not strictly carnivores. But I do not discount the possibility of participants subsisting on a carnivorous diet. On the flip side it was surprising to find such a small portion of furries who are vegetarian or vegan. Further research would benefit from investigating why furries subscribe to their diet of choice and if their association with animals and the fandom influences their dietary decisions.

Question 16: Years active in furry
There was a wide distribution of years active in the furry fandom among participants, but only 7% of those surveyed had been in the fandom longer than 10 years. There is not a great deal of analysis required for this question. It was included as a way of showing that the study is representing furries with varying numbers of years in the fandom behind them. However, it is interesting to note that Osaki's (2008) findings were fairly similar, though his data yielded a smoother distribution curve and found 13.4% participants considered themselves furry for a period greater than ten years. This is likely the result of his far larger sample collecting data that is more indicative of the population.

Conducting the survey via the Internet has had both benefits and drawbacks for this study. Using the Internet has made this study possible, has given participants anonymity and has given us the ability to reach users world wide - as long as they can read English. The Internet is also an appropriate place in which to study the furry community, as the Internet has played a large role in the development of the fandom (Patten, 1996). However, the way our survey was written has flaws and omissions, such as the exclusion of asexuality as an option for the question regarding sexual orientation, or how the question regarding sexual inclination has an option for polyandrous, but is missing an option for polygynous. We also encountered some confusion by the occasional participant who misunderstood a question. For example, a participant may have stated they were under the age of eighteen, yet said they had a high annual income. Luckily, the manual tally sorted out any of these responses and nearly all of the participants who made these errors were able to be contacted and their answer amended. Not a single questionable survey was included in the tally, but this problem could have been averted had the survey been written to avoid any possible ambiguities, such as explaining what was meant by “primary occupation.”

Despite these flaws, by comparing the present study with furry surveys by Rust (2001), Gerbasi (2007), Wossmassler and Wen (2007) and Osaki (2008) we have been able to further generalise our conclusions to most types of furries as well as being able to validate (and sometimes question) our findings. However, any generalisations we make cannot extend further than furries with the ability to speak and/or read English found online or at conventions. After evaluating our findings and those of the aforementioned studies, we can say with reasonable certainty that 81% to 86.2% of furries are male, that 83.4% to 89% of online furries are Caucasian, that 82.8% to 83% of furries found online are not zoophiles, that 91.6% to 93% of furries found online are not plushophiles and that 3% to 4.8% of furries online are vegetarian.

Speaking less definitely, we also found evidence to show that significant numbers of furries are single, significant numbers are students, are generally low income earners, that there is a significant distribution of furries of all sexual orientations and that sexuality has a strong influence on furry – but is not the entirety of the fandom. There also appear to be some trends which are specific to a particular sub-group of furries. Most certain of which was that furries found at a convention are more likely to be in a relationship than furries found online.

While most of our findings (in comparison with the findings of others) tended to yield either conclusive or generalised results, there could be more research done to validate or refute the findings regarding the occupation, religion and education of furries. Future studies would benefit from learning from the methodological flaws and suggestions made by this study and investigating new questions raised by our findings, such as the possible disparities between furries found online and those attending conventions. This theory is possibly due to the age differences in the two sub-groups of furries as evidenced by the findings for the questions regarding education, sexual orientation and annual income. But there may well be other factors. In addition, there are questions asked in other studies which warrant replication, such as Gerbasi’s (2007) investigation of personality traits. In addition, the theories by Eppley et. al. (2007; 2008) on the motivations behind the use anthropomorphics in society could be applied to future studies on furry culture.

By pooling and analyzing the collective knowledge, we have learned a great deal. As more of these studies and investigations take place, we shall further our understandings of our fellow furries as a whole.

References

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Epley, N., & Waytz, A. (2008). When we need a human: Motivational determinants of anthropomorphism. Social cognition, 26 (2), 143–155.

Furry. (2007, May 11). In Wikifur, The furry encyclopedia. Retrieved May 18, 2007, from http://en.wikifur.com/wiki/Furry

Gerbasi, K. (2007). Furries from a to z: anthropomorphism to zoomorphism. Retrieved July 23, 2007 from http://www2.asanet.org/sectionanimals/articles/GerbasilFurries.pdf

Kinsey, A., Pomeroy, W., & Martin, C. (1948). Sexual behaviour in the human male. Philadelphia: W. B. Saunders, 651.

Osaki, A. (2008). State of the Fandom. Furry research centre. Retrived August 30, 2008 from http://furcenter.org/publications.php

Patten, F. (1996). A Chronology of the Furry Fandom. YARF! (46). Retrieved September 29, 2008 from http://yarf.furry.com/chronology.html

Rossmassler, L. & Wen, T.  (May, 2007). Furries are people too: Social and cognitive factors in unique social communities. Poster presented at the Seventh Annual Stanford Undergraduate Psychology Conference, Stanford.

Rust, D. J. (2001). The Sociology of Furry Fandom. The darken hollow. Retrieved October 30, 2006, from http://www.visi.com/~phantos/furrysoc.html

Sabaté, J. (2001). Vegetarian nutrition. Boca Raton: CRC Press, 23-26.

Weiten, W. (2005). Psychology themes & variations (sixth edition, briefer version). Belmont: Wadsworth, 44.

Winick, M. (1980). Nutrition in health and disease. New York: John Wiley & Sons, 192-193.