Welfare Assessment

An ethogram of acute pain behaviors in cats based on expert consensus

An improved understanding of behaviors reflecting acute pain in cats is a priority for feline welfare. The aim of this study was to create and validate a comprehensive ethogram of acute pain behaviors in cats that can discriminate painful versus...

Year Published: 2023Topics: Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Cat

Citation: Marangoni, S., Beatty, J., Steagall, P. V. 2023. An ethogram of acute pain behaviors in cats based on expert consensus. PLOS ONE 18(9), e0292224.

Positive affect and learning: Exploring the “Eureka Effect” in dogs

Animals may experience positive affective states in response to their own achievements. We investigated emotional responses to problem-solving in dogs, separating these from reactions to rewards per se using a yoked control design. We also questioned whether the intensity of...

Year Published: 2014Topics: Animal Training, Emotion, Pain, & Sentience, Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Dog

Citation: McGowan, R. T. S., Rehn, T., Norling, Y. et al. 2014. Positive affect and learning: Exploring the “Eureka Effect” in dogs. Animal Cognition 17(3), 577–587.

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.

Infrared thermography as a non-invasive method for evaluating stress in lactating dairy cows during isolation challenges

Year Published: 2023Topics: Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Cattle

Citation: Mincu, M., Nicolae, I., Gavojdian, D. 2023. Infrared thermography as a non-invasive method for evaluating stress in lactating dairy cows during isolation challenges. Frontiers in Veterinary Science 10.

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.

Developing a feasible and sensitive judgement bias task in dairy cows

Judgement bias tasks (JBTs) are used to assess the influence of farm practices on livestock affective states. The tasks must be adjusted to the species and age group of focus. In cattle, most JBTs were designed for calves instead of...

Year Published: 2022Topics: Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Cattle

Citation: Kremer, L., van Reenen, C. G., Engel, B. et al. 2022. Developing a feasible and sensitive judgement bias task in dairy cows. Animal Cognition 25(2), 425–445.

Using photographs for rating severity degrees of clinical appearance in research mice enables valid discrimination of extreme but not mild and moderate conditions: A pilot study

To ensure good animal welfare in laboratory research and in stockbreeding severity ratings of the animals´ wellbeing are essential. The current study investigated how valid raters can evaluate different severity degrees of clinical appearance and how ratings might be influenced...

Year Published: 2023Topics: Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Mouse, Rodent

Citation: rueger, J. C., Boecker, M., Gauggel, S. et al. 2023. Using photographs for rating severity degrees of clinical appearance in research mice enables valid discrimination of extreme but not mild and moderate conditions: A pilot study. PLOS ONE 18(11), e0287965.

Assessing the welfare of captive group-housed cockroaches, Gromphadorhina oblongonota

The welfare of invertebrates under human care is of growing concern, particularly with the increasing interest in insect farming as an environmentally sustainable means of producing food. Additionally, individual welfare monitoring systems can be time-consuming and impractical for larger groups,...

Year Published: 2023Topics: Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Insect & Spider, Invertebrate

Citation: Free, D., Wolfensohn, S. 2023. Assessing the welfare of captive group-housed cockroaches, Gromphadorhina oblongonota. Animals 13(21), 3351.

Lateralised behavioural responses in livestock to environmental stressors: Implications for using infrared thermography to assess welfare conditions

Lateralised behavioural responses to environmental stressors have become more frequently used as indicators of social welfare in animals. These lateralised behavioural responses are under the control of asymmetrical brain functions as part of the primary functions of most vertebrates and...

Year Published: 2023Topics: Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Cattle, Chicken, Equine, Fowl, Goat, Pig, Sheep

Citation: Goma, A. A., Uddin, J., Kieson, E. 2023. Lateralised behavioural responses in livestock to environmental stressors: Implications for using infrared thermography to assess welfare conditions. Animals 13(23), 3663.

Developmental history and stress responsiveness are related to response inhibition, but not judgement bias, in a cohort of European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris)

Judgement bias tasks are designed to provide markers of affective states. A recent study of European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris) demonstrated modest familial effects on judgement bias performance, and found that adverse early experience and developmental telomere attrition (an integrative marker...

Year Published: 2019Topics: Rearing & Weaning, Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Bird, Other Bird

Citation: Gott, A., Andrews, C., Bedford, T. et al. 2019. Developmental history and stress responsiveness are related to response inhibition, but not judgement bias, in a cohort of European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris). Animal Cognition 22(1), 99–111.