Katherine (Katie) Koralesky

I use diverse methodologies to understand the human dimensions of animal welfare on farms and in companion animal settings. My research explores the role of policy in animal care practices, on-farm interventions to improve animal health and welfare, links between animal and human welfare, and views on biotechnology in animal agriculture. My broad aim is to improve animal welfare through relationship building and collaboration with people who care for or about animals.

Currently, I am investigating the social and ethical dimensions of gene editing in farm animals from the perspective of farmers, people developing gene editing technologies, members of the public, and animals. I am also supervising students who are researching Canadian Codes of Practice for dairy farming, and am involved in collaborations investigating qualitative research about dairy farming. I use research methodologies from diverse disciplines and conduct mixed-method surveys, interviews, focus groups, document analysis, frame analysis and reviews. I have a strong interest in the policies that shape animal care practices in differnet settings, and most recently used the sociological approach 'Institutional Ethnography' to examine how animal sheltering and protection policy and law organize what happens to animals who come to be involved in this system.

I also have a research interest in pedagogy, and have published research that investigated university instructor and undergraduate student views of the shift to online teaching due to the COVID-19 pandemic changed how students engaged with course content and their peers.