Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-22dnz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-26T10:44:09.824Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The use of conjoint analysis to determine the importance of factors that affect on-farm welfare of the dairy cow

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 January 2023

LJ Angus ,
H Bowen ,
LAS Gill ,
TG Knowles  and
A Butterworth
LJ Angus
Affiliation:
Clinical Veterinary Science, University of Bristol, Langford, Bristol, BS40 5DU, UK
H Bowen
Affiliation:
Clinical Veterinary Science, University of Bristol, Langford, Bristol, BS40 5DU, UK
LAS Gill
Affiliation:
Clinical Veterinary Science, University of Bristol, Langford, Bristol, BS40 5DU, UK
TG Knowles
Affiliation:
Clinical Veterinary Science, University of Bristol, Langford, Bristol, BS40 5DU, UK
A Butterworth*
Affiliation:
Clinical Veterinary Science, University of Bristol, Langford, Bristol, BS40 5DU, UK
*
* Contact for correspondence and requests for reprints: andy.butterworth@bris.ac.uk
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

A large range of variables can affect the welfare of the dairy cow, making it difficult to assess the overall ‘level of welfare’ of the individual animal. Two groups of individuals completed a questionnaire based upon the ‘five freedoms’: 26 respondents had expertise either in the field of dairy cow welfare or as practicing veterinary surgeons, and 30 were veterinary students in their penultimate year of study. Conjoint analysis was used to calculate the average importance scores (AIS) for 34 variables presented to the respondents as 52 ‘model cows’ in the form of grouped questions, phrases and pictures. Conjoint analysis identified the most important factors for each ‘freedom’: access to forage, body condition score, foot conformation, hock lesions, and the encouragement required for a dairy cow to walk into the parlour. There was a significant difference between the expert and student groups for seven out of 34 factors, which may be attributed to individual variation of opinion, knowledge, experience and expectation. The factors were ranked within each ‘freedom’ using the experts' AIS but it was not assumed that each freedom had equal ‘weight’; therefore, the factors within each freedom were compared only with factors within the same freedom. These scores produced a weighting scale, which was applied on-farm, in a preliminary exercise comparing ‘model’ and ‘perceived’ welfare scores.

Keywords

animal welfareconjoint analysisdairy cowfive freedomson-farmwelfare assessment
Type
Research Article
Information
Animal Welfare , Volume 14 , Issue 3 , August 2005 , pp. 203 - 213
Copyright
© 2005 Universities Federation for Animal Welfare

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Blowey, RW 1985 A Veterinary Book for Dairy Farmers. Farming Press: Ipswich, UKGoogle Scholar
Brambell FWR (Chairman) 1965 Report of the Technical Committee to Enquire into the Welfare of Animals Kept Under Intensive Livestock Husbandry Systems, Command 2836. Her Majesty's Stationery Office: London, UKGoogle Scholar
Broom, DM 1987 Relationship between welfare and disease susceptibility in farm animals. In: Gibson, TE (ed) Animal Disease — A Welfare Problem. British Veterinary Association Animal Welfare Foundation: London, UKGoogle Scholar
Broom, DM and Johnson, KG 1993 Stress and Animal Welfare. Chapman & Hall: London, UKCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) 2002 National Statistics. Available at www.defra.gov.ukGoogle Scholar
Ewbank, R 1987 Opening address. In: Gibson, TE (ed) Animal Disease — A Welfare Problem pp 4–6. British Veterinary Association Animal Welfare Foundation: London, UKGoogle Scholar
Fraser, D 1995 Science, values and animal welfare: exploring the ‘inextricable connection’. Animal Welfare 4: 103–117CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fraser, AF and Broom, DM 1997 Farm Animal Behaviour and Welfare, 3rd Edition. CABI Publishing: Wallingford, UKGoogle Scholar
Hair, J, Tatham, R, Anderson, R and Black, W 1998 Multivariate Data Analysis, 5th Edition. Prentice Hall: New Jersey, USAGoogle Scholar
Hall, SG 1989 Chillingham cattle: social and maintenance behaviour in an ungulate that breeds all year round. Animal Behaviour 38: 215–225CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hughes, BO and Curtis, PE 1997 Health and disease. In: Appleby, C and Hughes, B (eds) Animal Welfare pp 109–125. CABI Publishing: Wallingford, UKGoogle Scholar
Kilgour, R and Dalton, C 1984 Livestock Behaviour: A Practical Guide. Granada Publishing: London, UKGoogle Scholar
Leaver, JD 1999 Dairy cattle. In: Ewbank, R, Kim-Madslien, F and Hart, CB (eds) Management and Welfare of Farm Animals: The UFAW Farm Handbook, 4th Edition pp 17–47. Universities Federation for Animal Welfare: Wheathampstead, UKGoogle Scholar
Lindstrom, T and Redbo, I 2000 Effect of feeding duration and rumen fill on behaviour of dairy cows. Applied Animal Behaviour Science 70: 83–97CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Loeffler, K 1986 Assessing pain by studying posture, structure and function. In: Duncan, IJH and Molony, V (eds) Assessing Pain in Farm Animals. Commission of the European Communities: LuxembourgGoogle Scholar
Main, DCJ, Kent, JP, Wemelsfelder, F, Ofner, E and Tuyttens, FAM 2003 Applications for methods of on-farm welfare assessment. Animal Welfare 12: 523–528CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mench, JA and Mason, GJ 1997 Behaviour. In: Appleby, C and Hughes, B (eds) Animal Welfare pp 127–141. CABI Publishing: Wallingford, UKGoogle Scholar
Munksgaard, L and Simonsen, H 1996 Behaviour and pituitary-adrenal axis responses of dairy cows to social isolation and deprivation of lying down. Journal of Animal Science 74(4): 769–778CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Murray, RD 1990 A field investigation of causes of abortion of dairy cattle. Veterinary Record 127: 543–547Google ScholarPubMed
Petrie, A and Watson, P 2000 Statistics for Veterinary and Animal Science, pp 81-85, pp 115-116, pp 142-144. Blackwell Science: Oxford, UKGoogle Scholar
Reinhardt, V 1973 Social rank order and milking order in cows. Zeitschrift fur Ttierpsychologie [Journal of Comparative Ethology] 32: 281–292CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reinhardt, V and Reinhardt, A 1975 Cohesive relationships in a cattle herd (Bos indicus). Behaviour 77: 121–151CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rice, JA 1988 Mathematical Statistics and Data Analysis pp 453–510. Wadsworth and Brooks: Pacific Grove, California, USAGoogle Scholar
Seabrook, MF 1987 The psychological interaction between the stockman and its influence on performance of pigs and dairy cows. Veterinary Record 115: 84–87CrossRefGoogle Scholar
SPSS 1999 ISBN 0-13-017890-X. SPSS Inc: Chicago, IL, USAGoogle Scholar
Terlouw, EM, Schouten, WGP and Ladewig, J 1997 Physiology. In: Appleby, C and Hughes, B (eds) Animal Welfare pp 143–173. CABI Publishing: Wallingford, UKGoogle Scholar
Webster, AJF 1986 Health and welfare of animals in modern husbandry systems — dairy cattle. In Practice 8(3): 85–89CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Webster, AJF 1988 The welfare requirements of sick farm animals. In: Gibson, TE (ed) Animal Disease — A Welfare Problem pp 56–61. British Veterinary Association Animal Welfare Foundation: London, UKGoogle Scholar
Webster, AJF 1993 Understanding the Dairy Cow, 2nd Edition. Blackwell Science: Oxford, UKGoogle Scholar
Whay, HR, Main, DCJ, Green, LE and Webster, AJF 2002 Farmer perception of lameness prevalence. In: Proceedings of the 12th International Symposium on Lameness in Ruminants, 9–13th January 2002, Orlando, Florida, USA pp 355-358.Google Scholar