Farm Animal Cognition—Linking Behavior, Welfare and Ethics

Nawroth, Christian; Langbein, Jan; Coulon, M.; Gabor, Vivian; Oesterwind, Susann; Benz-Schwarzburg, Judith; Borell, Eberhard von

doi:10.3389/fvets.2019.00024

Cited by 82 publications

(66 citation statements)

References 211 publications

(225 reference statements)

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“…In addition, by highlighting that the visual mode of facial recognition from photographs is enough to identify a familiar human improves our understanding of the signals underlying individual recognition in horses. More generally, as discussed by (2020) 10:6302 | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-62940-w www.nature.com/scientificreports www.nature.com/scientificreports/ Nawroth et al in their review paper 39 , the degree to which domestic ungulates can demonstrate sophisticated socio-cognitive skills and are sensitive to subtle behavioral cues of conspecifics and humans should be taken into account in our everyday interactions with these animals and raises new ethical issues in relation to how we manage livestock in general.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Female horses spontaneously identify a photograph of their keeper, last seen six months previously

Lansade

Colson

Parias

et al. 2020

Sci Rep

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Horses are capable of identifying individual conspecifics based on olfactory, auditory or visual cues. However, this raises the questions of their ability to recognize human beings and on the basis of what cues. This study investigated whether horses could differentiate between a familiar and unfamiliar human from photographs of faces. Eleven horses were trained on a discrimination task using a computer-controlled screen, on which two photographs were presented simultaneously (32 trials/ session): touching one was rewarded (S+) and the other not (S−). In the training phase, the S+ faces were of four unfamiliar people which gradually became familiar over the trials. The S− faces were novel for each trial. After the training phase, the faces of the horses' keepers were presented opposite novel faces to test whether the horses could identify the former spontaneously. A reward was given whichever face was touched to avoid any possible learning effect. Horses touched the faces of keepers significantly more than chance, whether it was their current keeper or one they had not seen for six months (t = 3.65; p < 0.004 and t = 6.24; p < 0.0001). Overall, these results show that horses have advanced human facerecognition abilities and a long-term memory of those human faces.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Female horses spontaneously identify a photograph of their keeper, last seen six months previously

Lansade

Colson

Parias

et al. 2020

Sci Rep

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“…Therefore, there already is much knowledge about the expression of emotions in these species and good methodological approaches to study emotions and personality have already been developed, making it easier to study the role of laterality therein. There is also a growing body of studies on physical and social cognition in ungulate livestock [41], providing opportunities to study the role of laterality in cognitive performance. In addition, several of these ungulate species have been shown to be useful neuroscience models, such as pigs for modelling human brain disorders [42] and sheep for face identity and emotion processing [43].…”

Section: Why Study Functional Laterality In Ungulate Livestock?mentioning

confidence: 99%

From Science to Practice: A Review of Laterality Research on Ungulate Livestock

Leliveld

2019

Symmetry

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In functional laterality research, most ungulate livestock species have until recently been mainly overlooked. However, there are many scientific and practical benefits of studying laterality in ungulate livestock. As social, precocial and domestic species, they may offer insight into the mechanisms involved in the ontogeny and phylogeny of functional laterality and help to better understand the role of laterality in animal welfare. Until now, most studies on ungulate livestock have focused on motor laterality, but interest in other lateralized functions, e.g., cognition and emotions, is growing. Increasingly more studies are also focused on associations with age, sex, personality, health, stress, production and performance. Although the full potential of research on laterality in ungulate livestock is not yet exploited, findings have already shed new light on central issues in cognitive and emotional processing and laid the basis for potentially useful applications in future practice, e.g., stress reduction during human-animal interactions and improved assessments of health, production and welfare. Future research would benefit from further integration of basic laterality methodology (e.g., testing for individual preferences) and applied ethological approaches (e.g., established emotionality tests), which would not only improve our understanding of functional laterality but also benefit the assessment of animal welfare.

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“…In the last 65 years, understanding of higher cognitive processes in animals advanced dramatically (Nawroth et al, 2019), as well as in the development and validation of farm animal welfare assessment methods (EFSA, 2012a, b, c, d, e, f;EFSA, 2015a, b, c). Perhaps the most significant improvement of the welfare of farm animals was achieved in the conditions of housing with the adoption of the five freedoms proposed by the Brambell Committee: to be able to get up, lie down, turn around, do self-care and stretch their limbs.…”

Section: The Most Important Animal Welfare Dilemmasmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Today, the need to update thoughts on animal welfare in the sense that it moves away from the "Five Freedom" to "Life worth living" is often pointed out (Mellor, 2016). In the papers published by von Keyserlingk et al (2009) and Nawroth et al (2019), it has been noted that general knowledge about farm animals' relations with the environment is necessary, and it has significant importance for a range of stakeholders (citizens, politicians, cognitive ethologists and philosophers).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The most important dilemmas regarding the welfare of farm animals

et al. 2019

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In this review paper, contradictions in modern livestock production as dilemmas of farm animal welfare are considered. The main dilemma concerns the question of whether extensive production in small farms is generally better than intensive production in large farms. The next dilemma relates to an intensive selection of animals and its impact on the emergence of welfare problems. Another dilemma is related to the two main interconnected problems of pig welfare in individual farrowing pens: the piglet death by crushing and the sows' movement restriction. Similarly, welfare dilemma is the paradox of parent flocks of broiler line breeding that could not be solved until the pressure for genetic advancement in production is required due to the economic efficiency. The next example of the dilemma is the widespread practice of tail docking in piglets in order to reduce the risk of tail biting. Although the tail docking is painful and may cause death, anaesthesia is usually not applied on farms. A similar example of the dilemma is debeaking in the laying hens and the occurrence of feather pecking in free rearing systems. It is important to notice the difference between the described dilemmas, where one premise opposes the other, which is essentially a conflict between the animal welfare goals and other values, such as economic, ethical and moral issues. Finally, there are also some dilemmas about the consumers' willingness to pay a higher price of products that originate from welfare friendly rearing conditions.

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Farm Animal Cognition—Linking Behavior, Welfare and Ethics

Cited by 82 publications

References 211 publications

Female horses spontaneously identify a photograph of their keeper, last seen six months previously

Female horses spontaneously identify a photograph of their keeper, last seen six months previously

From Science to Practice: A Review of Laterality Research on Ungulate Livestock

The most important dilemmas regarding the welfare of farm animals

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