Zupan, Manja and Rehn, Therese and de Oliveira, Daiana and Keeling, Linda
(2016).
Promoting positive states: the effect of early human handling on play and exploratory behaviour in pigs.
Animal. 10
:1
, 135-141
[Research article]
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- Accepted Version
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Abstract
It is known that tactile stimulation (TS) during ontogeny modifies brain plasticity and enhances the motor and cognitive skills. Our hypothesis was that early handling including TS would increase play and exploratory behaviour in commercial pigs under standardized test conditions. Piglets from 13 litters were subjected to three handling treatments from 5 to 35 days of age: all the piglets were handled (H), none of the piglets were handled (NH) or half of the piglets in the litter were handled (50/50). At 42 days of age, the pigs' behaviour was observed in pairs in a novel pen with a toy' (tug rope). The main results were that more locomotor play was performed by pigs from litters where all or half of them had been handled, whereas social exploratory behaviour was more pronounced in pigs from litters where half of them had been handled. Although behaviour was affected by the interaction of treatment with sex or with weight category, we propose that the handling procedure does seem to have acted to increase locomotor skills and that handling half of the piglets in the litter may have triggered a series of socio-emotional interactions that were beneficial for the whole group.
Authors/Creators: | Zupan, Manja and Rehn, Therese and de Oliveira, Daiana and Keeling, Linda | ||||||
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Title: | Promoting positive states: the effect of early human handling on play and exploratory behaviour in pigs | ||||||
Series Name/Journal: | Animal | ||||||
Year of publishing : | 2016 | ||||||
Volume: | 10 | ||||||
Number: | 1 | ||||||
Page range: | 135-141 | ||||||
Number of Pages: | 7 | ||||||
Publisher: | Cambridge University Press, The Animal Consortium | ||||||
ISSN: | 1751-732X | ||||||
Language: | English | ||||||
Publication Type: | Research article | ||||||
Refereed: | Yes | ||||||
Article category: | Scientific peer reviewed | ||||||
Version: | Accepted version | ||||||
Full Text Status: | Public | ||||||
Subjects: | (A) Swedish standard research categories 2011 > 4 Agricultural Sciences > 402 Animal and Dairy Science > Animal and Dairy Science. | ||||||
Agrovoc terms: | swine, piglets, behaviour, play behaviour | ||||||
Keywords: | pigs, welfare, positive psychology, stressors, social behaviour | ||||||
URN:NBN: | urn:nbn:se:slu:epsilon-e-4913 | ||||||
Permanent URL: | http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:slu:epsilon-e-4913 | ||||||
Additional ID: |
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ID Code: | 15494 | ||||||
Faculty: | VH - Faculty of Veterinary Medicine and Animal Science | ||||||
Department: | (VH) > Dept. of Animal Environment and Health | ||||||
Deposited By: | SLUpub Connector | ||||||
Deposited On: | 05 Jun 2018 07:03 | ||||||
Metadata Last Modified: | 09 Sep 2020 14:17 |
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