Injury alters motivational trade-offs in calves during the healing period.

ABSTRACT: Injury can produce long-lasting motivational changes that may alter decisions made under risk. Our objective was to determine whether a routine painful husbandry procedure, hot-iron disbudding, affects how calves trade off risk avoidance against a competing motivation (i.e., feeding), and whether this response depends on time since injury. We used a startle test to evaluate this trade-off in calves disbudded 0 or 21 days previously and non-injured control calves. For 3 days, calves were individually habituated to the testing arena in which they received a 0.5 L milk meal via a rubber teat. On the 4^th day, upon approaching the milk reward, the calf was startled by a sudden noise. We assessed the duration and magnitude of the calf's startle response, their latency to return to the

SUBMITTER: Adcock SJJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7994642 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature