Journal
JOURNAL OF DAIRY SCIENCE
Volume 102, Issue 11, Pages 10677-10694Publisher
ELSEVIER SCIENCE INC
DOI: 10.3168/jds.2019-16325
Keywords
cognition; motivation; preference; aversion; anhedonia
Funding
- Canada's Natural Science and Engineering Research Council
- NSERC
- Dairy Farmers of Canada (Ottawa, ON, Canada)
- British Columbia Dairy Association (Burnaby, BC, Canada)
- Westgen Endowment Fund (Milner, BC, Canada)
- Intervet Canada Corporation (Kirkland, QC, Canada)
- Novus International Inc. (Oakville, ON, Canada)
- Zoetis (Kirkland, QC, Canada)
- BC Cattle Industry Development Fund (Kamloops, BC, Canada)
- Alberta Milk (Edmonton, AB, Canada)
- Valacta (St. Anne-deBellevue, QC, Canada)
- CanWest DHI (Guelph, ON, Canada)
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Affective states, which refer to feelings or emotions, are a key component of animal welfare, but these are also difficult to assess. Drawing upon a body of theoretical and applied work, we critically review the scientific literature on the assessment of affective states in animals, drawing examples where possible from research on dairy cattle, and highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of scientific methods used to assess affective states in animals. We adopt the valence/arousal framework, describing affect as a 2-dimensional space (with valence referring to whether an experience is positive or negative, and arousal referring to the intensity of the experience). We conclude that spontaneous physiological and behavioral responses typically reflect arousal, whereas learned responses can be valuable when investigating valence. We also conclude that the assessment of affective states can be furthered using mood assessments and that the use of drug treatments with known emotional effects in humans can be helpful in the assessment of specific affective states in animals.
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