ABSTRACT

The preference tests have made a great contribution to promoting animal welfare. However, they are not always easily applicable and have some criticalities. Recently the anticipatory behavior has been used to detect the animals’ preference. In this study, we attempted to investigate the relationship between preference and anticipatory behavior. To this end, we tested on a group of dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) whether, with anticipatory behavior, it is possible to distinguish the animals’ preference for different objects and then use it as a preference test. Anticipatory behavior is exhibited throughout the animal kingdom, it is easy to induce and measure, and does not have the criticalities of other preference tests. Therefore, its use as preference test could facilitate the study of animals' preferences and contribute to the promotion of their welfare. Our results support the hypothesis of use anticipatory behavior as a preference test. In fact, dolphins have anticipated the arrival of objects highly preferred with a frequency three times higher than shown toward objects less preferred, providing further evidence of the correlation between anticipatory behavior and the animals’ preference.

摘要

偏好测试为促进动物福利做出了巨大贡献。然而，它们并不总是很容易应用并且有一些关键性。最近，预期行为已被用于检测动物的偏好。在这项研究中，我们试图调查偏好和预期行为之间的关系。为此，我们在一组海豚身上进行了测试（Tursiops truncatus) 是否可以通过预期行为区分动物对不同物体的偏好，然后将其用作偏好测试。预期行为在整个动物界均有体现，易于诱导和测量，不具备其他偏好测试的临界性。因此，将其用作偏好测试可以促进对动物偏好的研究，并有助于促进它们的福利。我们的结果支持使用预期行为作为偏好测试的假设。事实上，海豚已经预料到高度偏好的物体到达的频率比向不太偏好的物体显示的频率高三倍，这进一步证明了预期行为与动物偏好之间的相关性。