How many furries are there in america

Qualitative analyses asking participants in an open-ended fashion to explain benefits that the furry fandom provided for their research revealed ten primary benefits, in order of frequency: Furry was the way I met my partner online, at conventions, through mutual friends Furry provides us with shared activities to engage in e. They are presented here, in order of frequency, though it should be noted that positives and negatives were listed at a ratio of about , and that negatives were more common among participants whose partners were not furries.

Participants were asked, for 16 different categories, to estimate how much money they had spent over the course of their lifetime on furry-related content. They were also asked to indicate the most money they had spent on a single purchase from that category. We also calculated the percentage of participants who indicated they had spent money on that category.

Given the international nature of the sample, participants were asked to answer with respect to their local currency and to indicate what that currency was. Healthy passion is positively associated with purchasing more commissions and with less regret about furry-related purchases; in contrast, obsessive passion is associated with buying more commissions, but also with more regret about furry-related purchases.

Some of the least popular reasons cited were a spiritual connection to the animals, nostalgia, and associated with other, related fan interests. Specifically, the model posits that furries with a history of being bullied are more likely to anthropomorphize the world around them — including animals.

This tendency, in tern, is associated with a stronger interest in wishing to be more like a non-human animal, a greater tendency to see non-human animals as part of their ingroup, and, ultimately, a greater tendency to be furries.

This model is in line with prior research showing that people who feel ostracized or distant from humans tend to anthropomorphize the world around them. When asked about the extent to which sexual attraction played a role in their interest in sexual attraction, furries were incredibly divided on the issue:.

Notably, furries are turning to their furry friends before their other, non-furry friends, and even before their family. Qualitative analyses asked furries to explain whether they had ever felt out-of-touch or disconnected with a particular age group in the fandom and why.

Significantly more comments by a factor of about were directed toward younger furries in the fandom than toward older furries in the fandom. It's really awesome to know that we furries have some support outside of just ourselves to get a better understanding of our community. Essentially, a furry is someone who finds joy in the images, animation , fantasy of, or playing as anthropomorphized animals.

Judging by how many people attend Anthrocon the largest furry convention and subsidiary events, the number of furries in the world has only risen in almost three decades. Either way, thousands more furries attend conventions now than they did in In sum, the survey consisted of nearly questions.

It would be prohibitively long and tiresome to go over the results of each of these questions individually, and so below are some of the more interesting summaries of the data which has thus far been analyzed.

As always, if you have any questions or want clarification, please contact us see link on the sidebar. Please note that all collected information is presented here in aggregate summarzied form, and there is absolutely NO identifying information in the data. We have no way of tracing responses back to the original participant this is an anonymous survey. Additionally, any unique responses e.

Q2: Where did the furries in your sample come from? Q3: How old is the average furry? Q4: What is the ethnic breakdown of the furry fandom? Q5: What is the sex breakdown of the furry fandom? Q6: What is the gender breakdown of the furry fandom? Q7: Sexual orientation in the fandom: Are furries gay, straight, bisexual, or something else?

Q8: Furry sexuality: Behaviour, attraction, and love: the same thing? Q9: Are furries mostly single or in relationships? Q What kind of families do furries come from? Q What kind of education does the average furry have?

Q How long has the average furry been a furry for? Q How much of your sample was furry? Q Is there a difference between a "furry" and a "furry fan"? Q Is furry something you are, or something you do? Q How many furries own fursuits? Q How did furries come to associate with the furry community? Q What "makes" furries "furry"? Q What are furries like, personality-wise? Q How many fursonas has the average furry had? Q Do furries choose predator or prey species?

Q What exactly is "furry culture"? Q What are the attitudes of furries towards various furry subcultures? Q What interests do furries have? Q How close do furries feel to the furry community?

Q How big is the furry fandom? Q How do furries interact with one another? Anthrocon and Summer Online Working Paper. Courtney Plante, Jun 12, , AM. Furry Statistics Q How "furry" is the average furry? Species Questions Q How many fursonas has the average furry had? Furry Community Q What exactly is "furry culture"? Furry Well-Being Q Are furries maladjusted or well-adjusted?

Wikifur, local furry forums, Flayrah, Furry News Network, etc As in previous surveys, the vast majority of our participants came from the United States. However, there were a number of participants from all over the world, making our survey an international one. It should be noted that although our sample drew quite heavily from North America, there are a number of reasons for this, including the sample being partially drawn from an American furry convention, and the fact that the survey was only in English, which likely excluded a significant number of furries from the international community.

While it is true that the furry community is a young and vibrant community, it is also true that the community is a very diverse one, with furries of all ages attending conventions and participating online and at local furmeets. As has been in the case in our previous surveys, the majority of participants in our survey self-identify as white.

There are, nonetheless, a multitude of racial and ethnic groups within the furry fandom, as seen below. It should again be noted that, given the North American nature of this sample, it is unsurprising that the majority of participants were white.

With translations into multiple languages, it should be possible to tap into parts of the furry community which, for the time being, are more difficult to access due to language barriers.

As has been the case in past years, the majority of the furry fandom is male. Interestingly, there appear to be slightly more females in the therian sample than in the furry sample. Even more interestingly, there are more than three times as many transgendered participants in the Therian sample as there were in the furry sample.

It is difficult to draw conclusions on exactly why there may be differences between these two samples, but future research may suggest reasons for these differences. It is important to note that there is a tremendous difference between biological sex and gender. Gender, on the other hand, is a social construction, a product of how a person is raised, the environment around them and how they see themselves.

As such, it is entirely possible for a biological male to describe themselves as "feminine", and for biological females to self-identify as "masculine". This suggests, perhaps unsurprisingly, that sex and gender are not one and the same, in particular among the furry community. In a follow-up analysis we asked participants to identify whether or not their fursonas were the same gender as they were 1 , sometimes different 3 , or a completely different gender 5 from their own, non-fursona gender.

We looked at this for both males and females. We then looked at the difference between biological males and females on this willingness to have a fursona of a different gender than their own. We found a statistically significant difference between males and females, such that female furries were more likely than male furries to have a fursona that was a different gender than their own.

The data on sexual orientation of furries replicates our past findings, finding that the sexual orientation of furries is distributed quite a bit across the entirety of the sexual orientation dimension. In particular, our sample showed that there were about 1.

It was also found that females were statistically significantly more likely to be heterosexual than males in the fandom. As we did in the last survey, we also had participants rate the sexual orientation of their fursonas. Supporting our previous findings, we again found that furries, on average, tended to have fursonas that were slightly more homosexual than they were.

There are a number of possible reasons for this e. Future research may help us to test whether or not this explanation, or others, can explain this consistent finding. In addition to our questions about sexual orientation, we also asked furries more specific questions about the way in which their attraction to others manifests itself.