Sheep are more cognitively sophisticated than commonly assumed. Understanding their cognitive abilities has direct implications for how we assess and improve their welfare.
The cognitive sophistication of sheep fundamentally changes how we should assess their welfare needs. Sheep are not simply passive responders to physical conditions - they have social preferences, remember individual relationships, and experience something analogous to loneliness and grief when separated from bonded companions. This means that routine farming practices like frequent regrouping, separation during lambing, and transport away from familiar flockmates cause more psychological distress than their stoic demeanour suggests. Welfare assessment tools need to account for the emotional as well as physical dimensions of sheep experience.