Research led by the University of Queensland has found that humans can tell if chickens are excited or disappointed, simply by the sound of their clucking
Research reveals that humans can accurately detect the emotional state of chickens from the sounds of their clucking, a finding that could improve the welfare of chickens and make it easier for consumers when purchasing poultry and their products.
Professor Jörg Henning from UQ's School of Veterinary Science said the researchers tested whether humans could correctly identify the context of calls or croaking sounds made by chickens in the world's most popular household animal.
The research methodology and findings
"In this study we used recordings of chickens vocalizing in different scenarios from a previous experiment," said Professor Henning.
"Two calls were produced in anticipation of a reward, which we called 'food call' and 'fast croaking.'
The researchers played the audio files to experimenters to test whether humans could identify the context in which the chickens' sounds were made, and whether different sociological origins and levels of experience with chickens affected correct identification.
Implications for the welfare of the chickens
"We found that 69 percent of all participants could correctly identify whether a hen sounded excited or disappointed," Professor Henning said.
"This is an amazing result and even more reinforcing to see that humans have the ability to perceive the emotional context of sounds produced by different species."
Professor Henning said the ability to detect emotional information from vocalizations could improve hens' welfare.
"The substantial proportion of participants who were able to successfully identify calls produced in reward-related contexts is significant," he said.
"It gives confidence that people involved in raising chickens can recognize the emotional state of the birds they are taking care of, even if they have no previous experience."
Future research and applications
"Our hope is that in future research, it will be possible to identify specific vocal cues that predict how humans assess the meaning in chicken calls, and these results can potentially be used to build artificial intelligence-based recognition systems for monitoring chicken calls," said Professor Henning. To monitor the chickens' voices and improve the understanding of their needs. In addition, such technology can have a positive effect on consumers and their conscience during the purchase of poultry and their products"
This research was published in the journal Royal Society Open Science.
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Comments
If the research shows that chickens have feelings then why do people eat them? My schnitzel is disappointed
Hahaha…. You don't have to be a genius to understand if an animal is in good condition or not. The problem is not that people don't understand - the problem is that *they don't care*!!
what's the excitement King Solomon understood the language of all animals.
"Humans deciphered the chickens' crowing code", about hundreds of thousands of years ago, every farmer and anyone who raises animals... should not waste money on infertile studies, it already seems ridiculous all these pseudo-studies that are published.
The neurolinguistic revolution…………. 12
A person has a natural knowledge.
The machine has no natural knowledge.
There is no doubt that the language of living creatures is based on their natural knowledge.
Every living being has its own natural knowledge.
An ant has the natural knowledge of an ant.
An elephant has the natural knowledge of an elephant,
A monkey has a natural monkey knowledge.
Living creatures have a language of noises that correspond to their natural knowledge, and they learn their language of noises from each other.
Natural intelligence and artificial intelligence.
A. Asbar