Research and Evidence-Informed Practice
Animal assisted coaching draws on a range of fields, including coaching psychology, counselling, psychotherapy, education, human–animal interaction, animal assisted interventions, anthrozoology, animal behaviour, wellbeing science and environmental psychology.
As an emerging area of practice, animal assisted coaching benefits from careful engagement with research and critical reflection. Practitioners should be cautious about making exaggerated claims and should distinguish between established evidence, promising practice, professional experience and areas requiring further research.
The Network encourages members to share relevant studies, reviews, case examples, practice-based evidence and research questions. We are particularly interested in research that explores outcomes, mechanisms of change, client experience, practitioner competence, animal welfare, ethics, risk management and supervision.
Evidence-informed practice involves more than citing research. It also includes practitioner expertise, client preferences and circumstances, ethical judgement, cultural context and the welfare of animals involved in the work.
Does Animal Assisted Coaching work?
Answering this question does depend upon what we mean by ‘work’. Research specifically on animal assisted coaching is currently limited, although animal assisted coaching/counselling is recognised within the wider field of animal-assisted interventions. Most published studies directly relevant to coaching appear to focus on horse-assisted or equine coaching, including studies of self-efficacy, affect, optimism, psychoemotional wellbeing, heart rate variability and animal welfare. Therefore, the International Network for Animal Assisted Coaching encourages evidence-informed practice while recognising that this is an emerging field requiring further research, careful evaluation and ethical scrutiny.
