Concept of Animal Welfare

Question 1

What are the definitions of animal welfare?

Answer 1

• state of wellbeing brought about by meeting the physical, environmental, nutritional, behavioural and social needs of the animal(s) under the care, supervision or influence of people
• in a state of complete mental and physical health, where the animal is in harmony with its environment

Question 1

What is the extrinsic worth of animals?

Answer 1

• production
• performance
• models of human disease

Question 2

What is the intrinsic worth of animals?

Answer 2

worth in its own right - highly culturally variable
based on perceived sentience and emotional capabilities of the species

Question 3

Define a sentient animal

Answer 3

one capable of feeling and for which those feelings matter, although given lack of speech, cannot conceptualise the feeling

includes hunger, pain, anxiety, social feelings

Question 4

Describe the relationship between level of sentience and level of empathy for a species

Answer 4

level of sentience determines level of empathy most of the time but not always

view of a rat depends on whether it is a pet, research or vermin

Question 5

What does the level of empathy determine?

Answer 5

the moral obligation to be concerned about the welfare of the species

Question 6

What did Broom 2014 and Paul et al 2020 state that sentience has the capacity for?

Answer 6

Broom 2014
- be consciously aware of the environment
- capable of cognitive processing
- experiencing emotions/feelings

these facets of sentience are highly inter-related - Paul et al 2020

Question 7

What is Integrated Information Theory?

Answer 7

• Phi (Ф) - quantity of integrated information in any physical system
• information encoded in the whole system is lost whenever the system is divided into parts
• treats consciousness as a continuous variable, higher Ф = fuller consciousness

Question 8

What is empirical evidence for integration information theory?

Answer 8

from observed correlations between apparent emergence of consciousness and rises in effective connectivity in
- different sleep stages - Massimini et al 2005
- anaesthesia - Ferrarelli et al 2010

Question 9

Describe McBride et al 2015’s study of awareness of external environment in animals

Answer 9

can sheep improve navigational ability through the use of a mirror?
- each breed divided into 2 sub-groups (mirror exposed and naive)
- mirror exposed sub-group then exposed to perpex mirror for 530min over 15 days

Question 10

How can perception of self be tested?

Answer 10

metacognition tested via mirror-induced stimulation (MIS) behaviour

Question 11

What are the 3 levels of MIS?

Answer 11

• exploratory and social behaviour as if observing a conspecific
• contingency behaviour where animal produces repetitive acts to test actions against visual stimulus
• self-directed behaviour where animal investigates a specific part of its body using the mirror

Question 12

What is the mark test?

Answer 12

Placing a foreign mark on a usually invisible location on the animal and observing if they recognise it in the mirror as themself by attempting to remove the mark

Question 13

Which animals can reach the self-directed behaviour level of MIS?

Answer 13

chimpanzees, orangutans, dolphins, elephants, magpies and humans

Question 14

Describe the measurability of cognitive processing

Answer 14

extremely measurable but difficult to draw a line between concerned or not concerned about welfare

Question 15

What is the affective state / affect of the animal?

Answer 15

emotional state of the animal, positive and negative affect
environmental aspects and induce this

Question 16

Why is measuring emotions important?

Answer 16

to determine sentience and thus obligation to be concerned about animal’s welfare
critically important in measurement of welfare

Question 17

Describe neural correlates in measuring emotions

Answer 17

certain emotional states light up certain areas in fMRI of brain

steiner & redish 2014

Question 18

How is disappointment defined?

Answer 18

recognition that one did not get the value expected

Question 19

How is regret defined?

Answer 19

recognition that an alternative action would have produced a more valued outcome

Question 20

What is the importance of the orbitofrontal cortex in regret?

Answer 20

in humans, orbitofrontal cortex active during expressions of regret, humans with damage here do not express regret

Question 21

What research is there involving regret in rats?

Answer 21

Steiner et al 2014 recorded from orbitofrontal cortex and ventral striatum in rats encountering wait or skip choices for delayed delivery of different flavours using an economic framework

Question 22

Describe the experimental design of Steiner et al 2014

Answer 22

1. The Restaurant Row task - large inner loop with four spokes going to different restaurant zones (banana, cherry, chocolate, and unflavoured).
2. On entry into a zone, a tone sounded, the pitch of the tone indicated the delay the rat had to wait in order to receive reward (higher pitch = longer delay).
3. Rats could skip or stay

high-cost choice after skipping a low-cost choice should induce regret

Question 23

Describe the results of Steiner et al 2014

Answer 23

• Rats looked backwards toward the lost option, cells within orbitofrontal cortex and ventral striatum represented the missed action
• Rats delay based of length of delay and food preference

Question 24

What are the FAWC Five Freedoms?

Answer 24

Freedom From:
- Hunger or thirst
- Discomfort
- Pain, injury or disease
- Express normal behaviour
- Fear and distress

Question 25

Describe the experimental design of Weiss 1971

Answer 25

Controllable and Uncontrollable stress:
- Rat 1 put into apparatus but received no shock
- Rat 2 received a warning signal before shock
- Rat 3 received no warning signal before shock

Question 26

What are the results of Weiss 1971?

Answer 26

Unexpected shock - massively high stress levels
expected shock - stressed but significantly less than unexpected
no shock - minor stress levels

Question 27

What did Duncan 1996 state about animal welfare?

Answer 27

Neither health, nor lack of stress nor fitness is necessary and/or sufficient to conclude that an animal has good welfare.
Welfare is dependent on what the animals feel

Question 28

Describe the domains model

Answer 28

Physical/Functional domains
- nutrition
- environment
- health
- behaviour

Mental Domain

Physical domains combine to make the mental domain, which determines the welfare state

Question 29

What is a limitation of the domains model?

Answer 29

an animal can be mentally fine by still have other aspects lacking in welfare

Question 30

What are the 2 approaches to measuring animal welfare?

Answer 30

Subjective experience: an animal’s feelings determine its welfare
Biological function: normal physiology and behaviour (ability to stay within physiological boundaries)