Short project description

Animal welfare focus is currently shifting from the mere prevention of suffering to also enabling animals to have positive experiences. Correspondingly, the focus of animal welfare research shifts from the study of negative experiences to the study of positive experiences, and novel indicators of positive animal welfare are being proposed to be used in on-farm welfare assessment.

Young animals are motivated to play when their primary needs are meet and there is no danger, while the occurrence of play is reduced when there are threats to welfare. Play behaviour is also suggested to a good indicator of positive experiences (Boissy et al. 2007, Physiol Behav 92:375-397), and this project aims to validate play behaviour as an indicator of positive animal welfare.

The thesis project will investigate if calves housed with social contact to other calves and environmental enrichment perform more play behaviour than calves housed alone in standard pens. The Thesis project will be part of a larger experimental study conducted at AU Foulum 2025 validating play behaviour as a positive welfare indicator.