Spotlight on positive animal welfare

Approaching animal welfare from a positive rather than negative perspective is helping change the way humans and animals interact, including in the context of farming.

That’s the message to emerge from a literature review of positive animal welfare (Paw) carried out by researchers at Scotland’s Rural College (SRUC).

Paw is thought to have come about as a response to there being too much focus on avoiding negatives in animal welfare science, prompting the SRUC team to examine the development of the concept over the last decade.

The review, which was designed to determine what Paw adds to the overall study of animal welfare, has now led to the publication of a scientific paper which identifies the main features of Paw as positive emotions, quality of life and happiness.

“We wanted to understand what the Paw themes are and what they add to the other literature on animal welfare,” said Professor Alistair Lawrence, from SRUC and Edinburgh University’s Roslin Institute.