Personal profile
Research interests
My PhD research measured engagement between autistic children and donkeys using mixed-methods that embrace diversity between and within species.
Current evidence often comes from test-re-test psychometric scores that demonstrate improvement in the areas that the child has been deemed deficient. This approach not only fails to capture the child’s abilities and focuses on their disabilities, it omits to include the affect of the child-equid relationship.
My thesis argues that child-equid interactions are dynamic. One participant will have an effect on the engagement of the other and this variable requires much more attention prior to reporting benefits of equine assisted activities (EAA’s).
Current Research Projects
Project 1.
A cross-cultural exploration of the interconnectedness of working equids (horses, donkeys and mules) and their humans’ though a one health - one welfare lens.
Project 2.
Opportunities for expression of natural problem solving behaviours in non-ridden equids (horses, donkeys and mules)
Publications
Whitham Jones (Forthcoming) Reframing Equine Assisted Activities with Symbiotic Ethics (book chapter) in Hurn, S. (eds) Symbiotic Ethics. Routledge.
Whitham Jones, M. (2019) Exploring methodologies for capturing multispecies engagment in Equid Assisted Activities: The perspective of autistic children and donkeys. Journal Animal Law &International Animal Welfare Science. No.3, July 2019, pp149-170
Whitham Jones, M. (2018) Hidden in Plain Sight. in Parent, I. (eds) A Horse is a Horse of Course. Compendium 3. Minds-n-motion.
Education/Academic qualification
Anthrozoology, PhD.
Award Date: 13 Feb 2018
Education (inc. SEN), MEd
PGCE Science
Psychology, BSc (hons)
External positions
Postdoctoral Honorary Fellow, University of Exeter
2019 → …Peer Reviewer for Society and Animal Journal
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