Animal welfare science has developed a toolkit of objective welfare indicators that can assess animal states more reliably than observation alone.
Welfare assessment science has moved from subjective judgment to validated objective measures. A stockperson who says their animals are happy can now be evaluated against grimace scores, play behavior frequency, and cortisol measures that provide more reliable data. These tools allow welfare claims by producers to be verified, welfare improvements to be measured, and welfare science to inform policy with evidence rather than assertion.