Research into positive emotions in farm animals is documenting that these species experience pleasure, play, and contentment in ways that should inform welfare standards.
The documentation of positive emotions in farm animals represents a paradigm shift in welfare science. It is no longer sufficient to ask whether animals are not suffering — we must also ask whether they are experiencing positive states that constitute flourishing. A cow that displays joy when first going to pasture, a pig that plays enthusiastically, a chicken that dust bathes contentedly — these are not incidental observations but scientifically meaningful welfare data. Welfare standards that only prevent negative states are meeting a lower bar than we should accept for cognitively sophisticated, emotionally complex animals.