Measuring Social Needs
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What 4 things does social environment comprise of?
1) Social structure 2) Social relationship 3) Social cues 4) All associated internal states experienced by an individual
How does the Animal Welfare Act 2006 define social needs?
Social needs = To be with or apart from other animals, as appropriate
What does it mean by “ at a minimum appropriate quality of social environment to avoid poor welfare according to evolutionary adaptions, where animals cannot otherwise appropriately adapt”
The quality of social environment is the nature of the social environment the animal finds itself in Evolutionary adaption refers to: - Group living animals finding it hard to live alone - Asocial animals may find it hard to live with other animals This is because the animals may not be able to cope with changes in their social environment
What 5 things are social needs influenced by?
1) Adaptions to group vs solitary living 2) Differences in social structure 3) Differences in requirement for social learning 4) Differences in strength and nature of social relationships 5) Possible differences in complexity of social cognition and emotions
True or false Social needs do not differ between species
False Social needs differ between species
Within individuals what sorts of things modify social needs?
Sickness Pain Injury Specific social attachments Reproductive status Age Experience
True or false If an animal is sick it may want to be away from others or it may want care from others
True
True or false If the individual has formed a specific social attachment with another individual then those can influence the needs associated with that particular bond and whether or not it can adapt to separation
True
True or false With reproductive status the animal may be solitary most of the time but needs to interact with another individual to achieve fitness outcomes
True
What 5 things could inappropriate social environment lead to?
1) Absence of socio-positive opportunities 2) Frustrated motivation and fearfulness 3) Impacts on normal development and deficits in learning 4) Social stress, physical injury 5) Depression
True or false Social environment can also impact individuals through social transmission of emotions and/or the experience of complex social emotions if the species is capable
True
True or false It’s important to establish what we need to monitor and what makes a good social environment
True
What 3 things do we need to establish in terms of what we need monitor and what makes a good social environment?
1) We need to establish what the animals social needs and wants are 2) We also need to establish the impacts of provision and non-provision of the animals social wants and needs 3) Understanding capacities for emotional contagion/social transmission, social cognition and social emotion to comprehensively identify risks to welfare
True or false All species are not flexible in adapting to differences from free living
False Some species are more flexible than others in adapting to differences from free living
True or false If we know natural social structure and flexibility, quality of social relationships and the animals capacity for negative and positive social emotions we can formulate hypothesises about how welfare could be impacted To test hypothesises about how welfare could be impacted you use social and non-social welfare indicators to look at how that might more widely impact the animal
True
True or false When we’re thinking about the importance of aspects of social environment we can use the idea of motivation to access or avoid these in order to help us develop our ideas about that
True
True or false When we’re thinking about the importance of aspects of social environment we can use the idea of motivation to access or avoid these in order to help us develop our ideas about that
True
What is social reinstatement a measure of?
Social reinstatement is considered a measure of sociality or the tendency of a particular species to associate in social groups
True or false Social reinstatement can vary between individuals
True
True or false Social reinstatement can not be genetically selected for
False Social reinstatement can be genetically selected for
Explain how a social reinstatement test works
In a social reinstatement test a subject animal is put in a box and is released to join a group of conspecifics You would then measure: Latency to reach companions after being released from the start box Duration running on a treadmill to retain contact with companions
True or false Social reinstatement is quite telling in terms of response to social isolation and how motivated an animal is to get back to a group of animals
True
True or false Social reinstatement tests suffer from the same limitations as any preference tests or approach avoidance test
True
What do you need to think about when doing a social reinstatement test?
We also need to think about access time in terms of reward When doing a social reinstatement test we need to think about what elements of access beyond just getting contact with the reward are important and rewarding to the animal This is done to sufficiently represent the type of test that we want to address