Welfare, Stress, and the Evolution of Feelings
Section snippets
Feelings, Emotions, and Consciousness
Three of the ways in which feelings can arise in an individual are as follows. First, inputs to sensory systems may result in changes in the brain, which we refer to as sensations or perceptions. Some of these have wide-ranging effects within the brain in addition to information processing, storage as memory, or initiation of activity modification. They lead to feelings in the individual, for example, pain or sexual gratification (Ottoson, 1983; Swenson and Reece, 1993). Second, various neural
Welfare
Welfare is a term restricted to animals, including humans, and hence not used for other organisms or inanimate objects. It is used in science and in legislation and therefore must have a meaning precise enough for such use. Welfare refers to a characteristic of an individual rather than to something given to it, it must be measurable in a scientific way, and it must vary over a scale from very good to very poor (Curtis, 1986; Duncan, 1987; Broom, 1988, 1991, 1996; Broom and Johnson, 1993, pp.
Summary
Animals have systems for recognizing harmful or favorable stimuli and for monitoring the effects of environmental conditions on themselves. They also have a range of methods for attempting to cope with perceived or actual adversity. Mechanisms involving learning tend to maximize the chances that things that enhance fitness will happen to them, and tend to minimize the chances that things that reduce fitness will happen. As part of these various methods and mechanisms, positive and negative
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Welfare, Stress, and the Evolution of Feelings