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11.3 Animal Welfare Science 273

VetBooks.ir also contribute to ethical discussion; the latter the state of an individual in relation to its
will likely vary between countries, cultures,
environment, and this can be measured’
and organisations.
(Broom 1991). These studies generally use
physiological or psychological (usually meas-
ured through behavioural expression) met-
11.3 Animal Welfare Science rics to measure an animals’ stress response in
different situations (Broom 2011). This area
Central to the debate of whether animals of animal welfare science has dominated the
have the capacity to suffer is whether they methods chosen to study welfare, the ques-
possess consciousness and/or sentience tions asked and the prevailing attitude that
(Dawkins 1980). Historically few have animal welfare science can be largely deter-
attempted to empirically study animal con- mined by the extent to which an animal
sciousness and emotion; as much as anything thrives in captivity; evidenced for the most
the study of the subjective affective world of part on production indices, i.e. mortality,
humans is difficult to traverse, so this under- morbidity, fecundity, and growth rates. This
taking in animals is also very difficult approach is underpinned by our understand-
(Dawkins 2008). To move the study of animal ing of stress biology; the extent to which ani-
welfare forward, Dawkins, acknowledging mals’ are able to meet (or cope with) challenges
that the study of animal consciousness is cen- in their environment (Moberg and Mench
tral to considerations about animal welfare, 2000). In the most extreme situations, captive
suggested that we can infer much about ani- animals that are not able to adapt their physi-
mal welfare through two simple questions: ological or psychological response appropriately
(i) Are the animals healthy? and (ii) Do they to challenges will die. For a great entertaining
have what they want? (Dawkins 2004). overview of stress biology, which relates to
Following in this direction a number of stud- humans but has biological relevance to zoo
ies prior to this, focussed on animals’ prefer- animal welfare too, check out Sapolsky
ences, or how hard they might ‘work’ for (1998); it has been written explicitly to be pal-
resources within their environment (review atable and engage all audiences.
Dawkins 1990; Fraser and Matthews 1997); A third avenue adopted in the study of ani-
these studies were considered to address the mal welfare is to appreciate and respect the
question ‘What do animals’ want?’ More animals’ telos, ‘the set of needs and interests
recently studies of cognitive bias, testing which are genetically based and environ-
whether animals are optimists or pessimists, mentally expressed, which collectively con-
and how the consequential choices they stitute or define the form of life or way of
make are affected (Harding et al. 2004) have living by that animal, and whose fulfilment
been instrumental into shedding light on the or thwarting matter to the animal’ (Rollin
emotional capacity of animals. Further work 2003). An easier way of considering this view
in this area suggests that the majority of ver- was proposed by environmental philosopher
tebrate animals are sentient beings and are Bernard Rollin, who suggested that ‘Birds
able to feel both positive and negative emo- gotta fly and fish gotta swim’ and as animals
tions and affective states (Guesgen and deviate from these features which typify
Bench 2017; Paul and Mendl 2018). them, so too would their welfare state (Rollin
It is likely that the difficulties inherent in 1990) (Figure 11.1).
studying animal emotional experience, led to Taken together, these three pillars within
the large body of work and bias in animal the field of animal welfare science have been
welfare science, which has focussed on the referred to as the study of the animals’ mind,
biological functioning of animals (Barnett body, and nature (Duncan and Fraser 1997)
and Hemsworth 1990). This functioning (Figure 11.2). Others have suggested that an
approach is often considered to ‘refer[s] to animal’s natural history and evolutionary