Animal welfare science is a growing interdisciplinary field combining ethology, physiology, and philosophy to measure and improve animal wellbeing in applied settings.
Animal welfare science has developed rigorous methods for measuring subjective states in animals without anthropomorphism. Cognitive bias paradigms assess whether animals are in positive or negative affective states by testing how they interpret ambiguous stimuli. Preference testing establishes what animals want — foundational for enrichment design. Physiological indicators including cortisol and heart rate variability supplement behavioural assessment. The field has moved beyond the absence of suffering to measuring positive welfare states.