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Why it hurts: With freedom comes the biological need for pain

We argue that pain is not needed to protect the body from damage unless the organism is able to make free choices in action selection. Then pain (including its affective and evaluative aspects) provides a necessary prioritising motivation to select...

Year Published: 2023Topics: Emotion, Pain, & SentienceAnimal Type: All/General

Citation: Farnsworth, K. D., Elwood, R. W. 2023. Why it hurts: With freedom comes the biological need for pain. Animal Cognition 26(4), 1259–1275.

Fostering animal welfare and advancing 3Rs principles through the establishment of a 3Rsadvisory group

Based on the current state of science, the use of animals remains essential in bringing safe and effective medicines to patients. Respect for laboratory animal welfare and the application of 3Rs principles (the replacement, reduction, and refinement of animal use...

Year Published: 2023Topics: Regulations & Ethical ReviewAnimal Type: All/General

Citation: Graham, J. C., Wong, L., Adedeji, A. O. et al. 2023. Fostering animal welfare and advancing 3Rs principles through the establishment of a 3Rsadvisory group. Animals 13(24), 3863.

Bridging pure cognitive research and cognitive enrichment

Cognitive enrichment is a growing subset of environmental enrichment for captive animals. However, it has been difficult for practitioners to design, implement, and evaluate relevant and appropriate cognitive challenges. Even though pure comparative cognition researchers focus on fundamental evolutionary questions,...

Year Published: 2022Topics: Environmental EnrichmentAnimal Type: All/General

Citation: Clark, F. E. 2022. Bridging pure cognitive research and cognitive enrichment. Animal Cognition 25(6), 1671–1678.

Severity classification of laboratory animal procedures in two Belgian academic institutions

According to the EU Directive 2010/63, all animal procedures must be classified as non-recovery, mild, moderate or severe. Several examples are included in the Directive to help in severity classification. Since the implementation of the Directive, different publications and guidelines...

Year Published: 2023Topics: Regulations & Ethical ReviewAnimal Type: All/General

Citation: De Vleeschauwer, S., Lambaerts, K., Hernot, S. et al. 2023. Severity classification of laboratory animal procedures in two Belgian academic institutions. Animals 13(16), 2581.

Cognitive enrichment and welfare: Current approaches and future directions

Cognitive enrichment” is a subset of enrichment that has gained interest from researchers over the past decade, particularly those working in zoos. This review explores the forms of cognitive enrichment that have been attempted for laboratory, farmed and zoo animals...

Year Published: 2017Topics: Environmental EnrichmentAnimal Type: All/General

Citation: Clark, F. 2017. Cognitive enrichment and welfare: Current approaches and future directions. Animal Behavior and Cognition 4(1), 52–71.

Animal welfare: Could adult play be a false friend?

There is no consensus regarding the functions of play. As play behavior is a characteristic of young stages of development, it has been suggested that the higher prevalence of adult play observed in domestic animals could be the result of...

Year Published: 2015Topics: Natural Behavior, Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: All/General, Equine, Macaque, Nonhuman Primate

Citation: Blois-Heulin, C., Rochais, C., Camus, S. et al. 2015. Animal welfare: Could adult play be a false friend? Animal Behavior and Cognition 2(2), 156–185.

BrainWAVE: A flexible method for noninvasive stimulation of brain rhythms across species

Rhythmic neural activity, which coordinates brain regions and neurons to achieve multiple brain functions, is impaired in many diseases. Despite the therapeutic potential of driving brain rhythms, methods to noninvasively target deep brain regions are limited. Accordingly, we recently introduced...

Year Published: 2023Topics: Disease/Experimental ModelAnimal Type: All/General, Mouse, Rodent

Citation: Attokaren, M. K., Jeong, N., Blanpain, L. et al. 2023. BrainWAVE: A flexible method for noninvasive stimulation of brain rhythms across species. ENeuro 10(2) ENEURO.0257-22.2022.

Fit for Purpose assessment: A new direction for IACUCs

The organization and function of the institutional animal care and use committee (IACUC) is the key component of government regulation and oversight of necessary scientific research using live animals and of AAALAC - International accreditation of animal care and use...

Year Published: 2021Topics: Regulations & Ethical ReviewAnimal Type: All/General

Citation: Kinter, L. B., Johnson, D. K., Weichbrod, R. H. et al. 2021. Fit for Purpose assessment: A new direction for IACUCs. ILAR Journal 62(3), 314–331.

The implications of cognitive processes for animal welfare

In general, codes that have been designed to safeguard the welfare of animals emphasize the importance of providing an environment that will ensure good health and a normal physiological and physical state, that is, they emphasize the animals' physical needs....

Year Published: 1991Topics: Emotion, Pain, & SentienceAnimal Type: All/General

Citation: Duncan, I. J., Petherick, J. C. 1991. The implications of cognitive processes for animal welfare. Journal of Animal Science 69(12), 5017–5022.

Animal agency, animal awareness and animal welfare

In nature, animals need to actively engage with the environment in order to prosper in survival and reproduction. Hence, agency is a central adaptive characteristic of animal life. In this paper, I propose that from the adaptive/functional point of view,...

Year Published: 2019Topics: Emotion, Pain, & Sentience, Environmental Enrichment, Natural BehaviorAnimal Type: All/General, Cattle, Chicken, Equine, Fowl, Goat, Pig, Sheep

Citation: Špinka, M. 2019. Animal agency, animal awareness and animal welfare. Animal Welfare 28(1), 11–20.