Natural Behavior

Play in rats: Association across contexts and types, and analysis of structure

Play has been proposed as a promising indicator of positive animal welfare. We aimed to study play in rats across contexts (conspecific/heterospecific) and types (social: pinning, being pinned; solitary: scampering), and we investigated its structure using behavioral sequence analysis. Group-housed...

Year Published: 2014Topics: Natural Behavior, Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Rat, Rodent

Citation: Melotti, L., Bailoo, J., Murphy, E. et al. 2014. Play in rats: Association across contexts and types, and analysis of structure. Animal Behavior and Cognition 1(4), 489–501.

Nosing around: Play in pigs

The predominant method of measuring welfare in swine focuses on overt physical ailments, such as skin lesions, lameness, and body condition. An alternative metric for assessing welfare in swine can be to measure the frequency and duration of positive behavioral...

Year Published: 2014Topics: Natural Behavior, Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Pig

Citation: Horback, K. 2014. Nosing around: Play in pigs. Animal Behavior and Cognition 2(2), 186.

Choice, control, and animal welfare: Definitions and essential inquiries to advance animal welfare science

The ways in which humans can support good welfare for animals in their care is an ongoing subject of debate: some place emphasis on the animals' physical health; others, on animals' ability to live “natural lives”; and others on animals'...

Year Published: 2023Topics: Environmental Enrichment, Natural BehaviorAnimal Type: All/General, Macaque, Nonhuman Primate

Citation: Englund, M. D., Cronin, K. A. 2023. Choice, control, and animal welfare: Definitions and essential inquiries to advance animal welfare science. Frontiers in Veterinary Science 10.

Play behavior in crocodilians

Play behavior in crocodilians is not uncommon, but it remains virtually undescribed in scientific literature. I present the first overview of play behavior of three types (locomotor play, object play and social play) in crocodilians based on original observations, published...

Year Published: 2015Topics: Natural BehaviorAnimal Type: Crocodile & Alligator, Reptile

Citation: Dinets, V. 2015. Play behavior in crocodilians. Animal Behavior and Cognition 2(1), 49–55.

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.

Play fighting versus real fighting in piglets (Sus scrofa): Similar patterns, different structure

When animals engage in ‘non-serious' fighting (play-fighting) they ‘borrow' motor patterns especially from the aggressive context. It may be difficult to distinguish play- and real-fighting. This is particularly true for piglets (Sus scrofa), which can use play-fighting as a substitute...

Year Published: 2022Topics: Natural BehaviorAnimal Type: Pig

Citation: Cordoni, G., Collarini, E., Gioia, M. et al. 2022. Play fighting versus real fighting in piglets (Sus scrofa): Similar patterns, different structure. Behavioural Processes 203, 104778.

Atypical play experiences in the juvenile period has an impact on the development of the medial prefrontal cortex in both male and female rats

In rats reared without play, or with limited access to play during the juvenile period, the dendrites of pyramidal neurons of the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) exhibit more branching than rats reared with more typical levels of play. This suggests...

Year Published: 2023Topics: Natural BehaviorAnimal Type: Rat, Rodent

Citation: Stark, R. A., Brinkman, B., Gibb, R. L. et al. 2023. Atypical play experiences in the juvenile period has an impact on the development of the medial prefrontal cortex in both male and female rats. Behavioural Brain Research 439, 114222.

Do bumble bees play?

A variety of animals have been found to interact with and manipulate inanimate objects ‘just for fun', that is, to play. Most clear examples of object play come from mammals and birds. However, whether insects interact with inanimate objects as...

Year Published: 2022Topics: Natural BehaviorAnimal Type: Insect & Spider, Invertebrate

Citation: Galpayage Dona, H. S., Solvi,C., Kowalewska, A. et al. 2022. Do bumble bees play? Animal Behaviour 194, 239-251.

Play behaviour positively relates to weight gain, feeding behaviour and drinking behaviour in weaner pigs (Sus scrofa)

Engagement in play behaviour has been associated with the presence of positive affective states and, thus, proposed to be an indicator of positive animal welfare. However, the interpretation of play in animals remains challenging due to the complexity of motivating...

Year Published: 2023Topics: Natural BehaviorAnimal Type: Pig

Citation: Franchi, G. A., Larsen, M. L. V., Kristoffersen, I. H. et al. 2023. Play behaviour positively relates to weight gain, feeding behaviour and drinking behaviour in weaner pigs (Sus scrofa). Applied Animal Behaviour Science 259, 105836.

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.