By Michael Brunt
Improving the lives of animals in agricultural systems has primarily focused on minimizing negative experiences. Positive welfare does not necessarily occur with the absence of suffering, but in combination with opportunities for behaviors or affective states desired by animals. Our aims were to describe how Canadian bovine veterinarians and veterinary students perceive the role of a veterinarian in positive vs. negative experiences for dairy cows and to describe their attitudes, professional normative values, and perceived ability to promote positive welfare for dairy cows. Canadian veterinary practitioners (n=78) and veterinary students (n=148) responded to an online cross-sectional survey and were asked a series of questions on a 7-point scale. Practices to minimize negative experiences were most important (mean±SE; 6.8±0.03), a balance of positive and negative experiences was less important (6.4±0.05), and encouragement of positive experiences scored lowest (6.0±0.06), although all scored highly (F2,444 =143.64, p<0. 01). Participants indicated that promoting positive experiences was less important than decreasing negative experiences (5.9±0.09). Participants had very favorable attitudes (6.3±0.04) and perceived favorable values (5.7±0.06) in the veterinary community towards positive welfare opportunities for dairy cows. Participants were confident that veterinarians could suggest positive welfare opportunities (6.1±0.06) but were uncertain that the decision to suggest these opportunities to producers was within a veterinarian’s control (4.3±0.11) and were not confident that implementation of positive welfare opportunities was under a veterinarian’s control (2.1±0.07). There were no differences in the quantitative analyses between veterinarians and veterinary students. We conclude that veterinarians are favourably disposed to positive aspects of welfare for dairy cows but may be more focussed on avoidance of negative aspects of welfare. Additionally, positive attitudes and positive professional values exist in the veterinary community towards positive welfare for dairy cows but that much uncertainty exists regarding a veterinarian’s ability to influence change to current practices.
