BackgroundDogs are ubiquitous in human society and attempts to manage their populations are common to most countries. Managing dog populations is achieved through a range of interventions to suit the dog population dynamics and dog ownership characteristics of the location, with a number of potential impacts or goals in mind. Impact assessment provides the opportunity for interventions to identify areas of inefficiencies for improvement and build evidence of positive change.MethodsThis scoping review collates 26 studies that have assessed the impacts of dog population management interventions.ResultsIt reports the use of 29 indicators of change under 8 categories of impact and describes variation in the methods used to measure these indicators.ConclusionThe relatively few published examples of impact assessment in dog population management suggest this field is in its infancy; however this review highlights those notable exceptions. By describing those indicators and methods of measurement that have been reported thus far, and apparent barriers to efficient assessment, this review aims to support and direct future impact assessment.

In this perspective article, we propose a well-being survey instrument based on Bhutan's Gross National Happiness (GNH) framework for use in community-based wildlife conservation projects. Allgood, Hofberg, Musikanski, Michelini and Moser (2019) found that while there is a need, there is not a well-being survey instrument that includes indicators to measure the impacts on community and wildlife for communality-based wildlife conservation projects. The instrument proposed in this paper is designed to meet the unmet need. It is developed based existing instruments as well as indicators adapted by the authors based on the authors' experience. The proposal concludes with recommendations for use of the instrument.