Spontaneous helping in pigs is mediated by helper's social attention and distress signals of individuals in need

Abstract

Helping behaviour is of special interest for prosociality because it appears to be motivated by the needs of others. We developed a novel paradigm to investigate helping in pigs ( Sus scrofa domesticus ) and tested 75 individuals in eight groups in their home pens. Two identical compartments were attached to the pen, equipped with a window, and a door that could be opened from the outside by lifting a handle. Pigs in all groups spontaneously opened doors during a 5-day familiarization. During testing, each pig was isolated once from its group and placed in one of the two compartments, in a counter-balanced order. In 85% of cases, pigs released a trapped group member from the test compartment within 20 min (median latency = 2.2 min). Pigs were more likely and quicker to open a door to free the trapped pig than to open a door to an empty compartment. Pigs who spent more time looking at the window of the compartment containing the trapped pig were more likely to help. Distress signals by the trapped pig increased its probability of being helped. Responses are consistent with several criteria for identifying targeted helping, but results can also be explained by selfish motivations.

The proximate regulation of prosocial behaviour: towards a conceptual framework for comparative research

“…Here we will focus on two contexts of prosocial behaviour, food sharing and helping, that have been frequently studied in a range of species (e.g. Feistner and McGrew 1989 ; Rutte and Taborsky 2007 ; von Bayern et al 2007 ; Ben-Ami Bartal et al 2011 ; Bräuer et al 2013 ; Carter and Wilkinson 2013 ; Jaeggi and Gurven 2013a ; Massen et al 2015 , 2020 ; Horn et al 2016 ; Lambert et al 2017 ; Melis 2018 ; Liévin-Bazin et al 2019 ; Dale et al 2019 ; Brucks and von Bayern 2020 ; Nolte and Call 2021 ; Laumer et al 2021 ; Moscovice et al 2023 ). For each context, we will apply our general definition of prosociality to identify what behaviours we consider food sharing and helping, respectively.…”

Changes in salivary oxytocin in response to biologically-relevant events in farm animals: method optimization and usefulness as a biomarker

“…Here we present a novel method to measure peripheral oxytocin non-invasively in an under-studied research group: farm animals. Due to their evolutionary history as herd animals ( Driscoll et al, 2009 ), farm animals are highly social species who can discriminate among individuals ( Nawroth et al, 2019 ), are sensitive to each other’s emotions ( Baciadonna et al, 2018 ), and show evidence for prosocial behavior ( Cordoni et al, 2023 ; Moscovice et al, 2023 ). Given their similarities with humans in physiology and brain ( Lunney et al, 2021 ), research that can identify preferred social partners and social contexts for farm animals has potential clinical implications and is also important for promoting positive welfare in production settings ( Lee et al, 2022 ).…”