Seeding the Grassroots of Research on Furries: Lessons Learned from 15 Years of Creative Knowledge Mobilization, Valuing Community Partnerships, and Correcting the Record on Stigmatized Communities with Evidence-Based Scholarship

Figures & data

Figure 1. Furscience branding projects 1a: furscience wordmark/logo. 1b: furscience/IARP hybrid logo 1c: furscience convention booth 1d: furloose parody 1e: the furry bunch parody 1f: just like you*

Table 1. Website metrics for furscience.com, IARP original (pre-furscience) website, and IAmRP (anime) website at various 12-month intervals.

Website Comparison	Timeline	Metric	Total for Period	Average Monthly	Growth
Part A
Furscience – Furscience	Apr 2016 – Mar 2017 Jan 2022 – Dec 2022	Visitors:	43,894 225,223	3,658 18,768	413%
Furscience – Furscience	Apr 2016 – Mar 2017 Jan 2022 – Dec 2022	Pageviews:	149,991 409,068	12,499 34,089	173%
Part B
IAmRP – IARP	Aug 2013 – Jul 2014 Apr 2011 – Mar 2012	New Users:	4,561 6,109	380 509	33.9%
IAmRP – IARP	Aug 2013 – Jul 2014 Apr 2011 – Mar 2012	Pageviews:	8,562 14,304	714 1,192	67.1%
Part C
IAmRP – IAmRP	Aug 2013 – Jul 2014 Jan 2022 – Dec 2022	New Users:	4,561 3,485	380 290	−23.6%
IAmRP – IAmRP	Aug 2013 – Jul 2014 Jan 2022 – Dec 2022	Pageviews:	8,562 9,278	714 773	8.4%
Part D
IARP – Furscience	Apr 2011 – Mar 2012 Jan 2022 – Dec 2022	New Users:	6,109 204,892	509 17,074	3,254%
IARP – Furscience	Apr 2011 – Mar 2012 Jan 2022 – Dec 2022	Pageviews:	14,304 409,068	1,192 34,098	2,761%

Notes. Furscience – Furscience  = first 12 months of Furscience traffic vs most recent 12 months of traffic (shows growth of Furscience over six years noting that first 12 months of traffic was increased with significant promotion).

IAmRP – IARP = first 12 months of IAmRP website vs first 12 months of IARP website traffic (shows the relative similarities between the original IARP website and the IAmRP website traffic).

IAmRP – IAmRP = first 12 months of IAmRP vs most recent 12 months of IAmRP website traffic (shows the stability of the traffic on the IAmRP website over nine years).

IARP – Furscience = first 12 months of old website vs most recent 12 months of new website (shows the immense growth of Furscience over the IARP website over 11 years).

*Growth ((Time 2 or bottom metric – Time 1 or top metric)/Time 1 or top metric × 100).

Figure 2. Graphic representation of the rate growth for Furscience and the IAmRP website: new user data in six-month periods (January 2019 – December 2022).

Total New Users for 2019-2022:

Furscience: 551,581

Anime: 15,994

Table 2. Website metrics for furscience (branding supported) and the international anime research project (branding non-supported).

Metrics	2019 (01–06)	2019 (07–12)	2020 (01–06)	2020 (07–12)	2021 (01–06)	2021 (07–12)	2022 (01–06)	2022 (07–12)	2019–2022	t-test
Users
Av Monthly (FS/A)	5,924/236	7,770/195	8,678/384	11,438/454	12,338/387	12,116/431	14,848/150	19,477/435	11,429/331
Furscience Total	35,544	46,619	52,067	68,629	74,029	72,695	89,085	116,859	548,605	t(7) = 7.48,
Anime Total	1,417	1,167	2,306	2,722	2,320	2,584	901	2608	15,875	p < .001
FS Increase	2408%	3895%	2158%	2421%	3091%	2713%	9787%	4381%	3356%
New Users (Note: first 12 months IARP (pre-FS) average monthly new users: 509; first 12 months IAmRP average monthly page new users: 380)
Av Monthly (FS/A)	5,976/235	7,581/194	8,625/384	11,334/663	12,163/385	12,152/430	14,759/148	19,390/432	11,491/332
Furscience Total	35,854	45,484	51,751	68,006	72,976	72,910	88,552	116,340	551,581	t(7) = 7.40,
Anime Total	1,407	1,161	2,301	3,978	2,309	2,578	888	2597	15,944	p < .001
FS Increase	2448%	3818%	2149%	1610%	3061%	2728%	9872%	4380%	3359%
Sessions
Av Monthly (FS/A)	7,473/272	9,379/230	10,377/449	13,514/803	14,221/466	14,188/524	17,265/209	22,355/592	13,596/412
Furscience Total	44,836	56,271	62,261	81,084	85,326	85,127	103,590	134,129	652,624	t(7) = 7.98,
Anime Total	1,630	1,381	2,692	4,816	2,797	3,146	1,252	3553	19,788	p < .001
FS Increase	2651%	3975%	2213%	1584%	2951%	2606%	8174%	3675%	3198%
Pageviews (Note: first 12 months IARP (pre-FS) average monthly pageviews: 1,192; first 12 months IAmRP average monthly pageviews: 714)
Av Monthly (FS/A)	18,224/420	21,240/428	23,110/787	27,141/1,342	26,458/816	25,655/981	30,681/424	37,497/1122	26,251/734
Furscience Total	109,343	127,442	138,661	162,845	158,748	153,928	184,085	224,983	1,260,035	t(7) = 12.49,
Anime Total	2,518	2,565	4,724	8,053	4,895	5,888	2,545	6733	35,208	p < .001
FS Increase	4242%	4868%	2835%	1922%	3143%	2514%	7133%	3241%	3478%
Unique Pageviews
Av Monthly (FS/A)	13,505/367	15,750/354	16,998/684	20,585/1,1443	20,809/666	20,248/831	24,446/342	30,486/945	20,353/616
Furscience Total	81,031	94,497	101,988	123,508	124,856	121,487	146,674	182,917	976,958	t(7) = 10.70,
Anime Total	2,204	2,126	4,103	6,855	3,997	4,983	2,051	5668	29,587	p < .001
FS Increase	3577%	4345%	2386%	1702%	3024%	2338%	7051%	3127%	3202%
Pages/Session
Furscience Total	2.44	2.26	2.23	2.01	1.86	1.81	1.78	1.68	1.93	t(7) = 1.53,
Anime Total	1.54	1.86	1.75	1.67	1.75	1.87	2.03	1.90	1.78	ns
FS Increase	58%	22%	27%	20%	6%	−3%	−12%	−12%	8%
Average Duration
Furscience Total	1:53	1:42	1:37	1:28	1:17	1:16	1:12	1:06	1:22	t(7) = .30,
Anime Total	0:59	1:42	1:24	1:25	1:24	1:33	1:33	1:33	1:27	ns
FS Increase	92%	0%	15%	4%	−8%	−18%	−23%	−29%	−6%
Bounce
Furscience Total	67.5	70.3	71.5	74.5	77	78	77.1	80.7	75.8	t(7) = .81,
Anime Total	79.6	72.3	70.5	73	76.6	70	69.5	68.3	72.8	ns
FS Increase	−15%	−3%	1%	2%	1%	12%	11%	18%	4%
Number Countries
Furscience Total	152	155	159	162	172	175	180	182	212	t(7) = 10.12,
Anime Total	91	84	96	107	99	98	71	98	146	p < .001
FS Increase	67%	85%	66%	51%	74%	79%	154%	86%	45%
Audience Outside of USA/Canada (%)
Furscience Total	30.4	30.6	32.4	31.8	32.9	34.5	30.2	29.1	31.4	t(7) = −8.75,
Anime Total	44.5	44.4	46.1	43	58.9	52.6	56.4	48.0	49.3	p < .001
FS Increase	−32%	−31%	−30%	−26%	−44%	−34%	−46%	−39%	−36%

Notes: Jan 1- Jan 21, 2019, data is missing and counted as zero for applicable Furscience metrics. Totals should be calculated by requesting data for the whole period and not summing to avoid overlaps and inflated scores. It is possible for new users to be higher than users due to a quirk of Google Analytics and how it processes users who are on the website when the date changes at midnight, which avoids double counting. FS Increase calculated: ((FS metric – Anime metric)/Anime Metric × 100). t-tests within-subjects (time) design.

Table 3. Search engine optimization data for furscience.com: Furscience ranking and keyword search traffic from Ubersuggest and SEMrush.

	Ubersuggest (US Traffic)		SEMrush (US Traffic)		Google
Search Term	Position^1	Search Volume	Position^2	Volume	Returns
furry	4	450,000	6	301,000	784 mil
furries	4	450,000	4	90,500	773 mil
what are furries	5	60,500	4	12,100	384 mil
what is a furry	3	60,500	2	40,500	1.77 bil
fursona	5	27,100	5	22,200	8.11 mil
whats a furry	2	12,100	2	9,900	2.21 bil
what’s a furry	3	12,100	2	5,400	1.54 bil
furry fandom	7	4,400	6	3,600	784 mil

Position¹: “The position this URL [furscience.com] is ranked in Google search.”

Search Volume: “The number of searches this particular keyword has during a month.”

Position²: “The position an analyzed domain gets in organic search results for a given keyword over a specific period of time.”

Volume: “The average number of times users have searched for a given keyword per month. We calculate this value over the last 12 months.”

Google returns: the number of items produced by searching the keyword.

Data Gathered from Ubersuggest (app.neilpatel.com) “Keyword by Traffic” and SEMrush (semrush.com) “Organic Keywords.”

Data from July 12, 2022.

Table 4. Furscience ranking from keyword search traffic analysis from ubersuggest and SEMrush.

Search Keyword	Source	Ranking Ubersuggest	Ranking SEMrush	Cites IARP or Furscience
Furry	Merriam-Webster.com	-	1	—
	Wikipedia.org	1	2	Cites Furscience
	Vox.com	2	3	Cites IARP
	WebMD	3	4	Recommends Furscience
	Urbandictionary.com	-	5	—
	Furscience.com	4	6	Is Furscience
Furries	Wikipedia.org	2	1	Cites Furscience
	Vox.com	1	2	Cites IARP
	CNN.com	3	3	Cites Furscience
	Furscience.com	4	4	Is Furscience
What’s a Furry	Vox.com	1	1	Cites IARP
	Furscience.com	2	2	Is Furscience
What is a furry	Vox.com	1	1	Cites IARP
	WebMD.com	2	3	Recommends Furscience
	Furscience.com	3	2	Is Furscience

Notes: (Furry, 2022; Brennan 2021; Fandom n.d.; Matthews 2014; Patterson 2018; Urban Dictionary 2005).

Furry. 2022. “Merriam-Webster.Com Dictionary.“ Retrieved from: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/furry

 Google Scholar

Brennan, Dan. 2021. “What is Furry Sex?” WebMD, June 21. Retrieved from https://www.webmd.com/sex/what-is-furry-sex

 Google Scholar

Fandom, Furry. n.d. In Wikipedia. Retrieved from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furry_fandom

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Matthews, Dylan. 2014. “9 Questions About Furries You Were Too Embarrassed to Ask.” Vox, March 27. Retrieved from: https://www.vox.com/2014/12/10/7362321/9-questions-about-furries-you-were-too-embarrassed-to-ask.

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Patterson, Thom. 2018. “Inside the Misunderstood Culture of Furries.” CNN, November 14. Retrieved from: https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/14/us/furries-culture/index.html

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