A pig’s life: how mood and personality affect the decisions of pigs

The judgements and decisions a pig makes are governed by their mood – whether good or bad – and their personality type, according to new research published today.

The new study, carried out by scientists specialising in animal behaviour and welfare at the University of Lincoln and Newcastle University, demonstrates for the first time that the combined mood and personality of an animal have a significant impact on its outlook.

The findings are published today (16th November 2016) in the Royal Society’s scientific journal, Biology Letters.

Previous research has revealed how, in humans, mood and personality affect our ‘cognitive biases’ – deviations in judgement which form our individual characteristics and personalities, complete with errors and imperfections. However, until now, it was not known whether the same process also affects how animals think.

Funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), the new study was designed to explore how mood and personality affect how optimistic or pessimistic pigs are. The researchers found that just like humans, domestic pigs are more likely to have a pessimistic outlook on life if they are in a bad mood.

Project leader Professor Lisa Collins, from the University of Lincoln’s School of Life Sciences, explained: “In humans, mood and personality interact to determine cognitive bias but this was not something that had previously been investigated in any other animals. The results of our study clearly show that those pigs living in a worse environment were more pessimistic, and those in a better environment were much more optimistic. Importantly, this finding demonstrates that humans are not unique in combining longer term personality traits with shorter term mood biases when making judgements.”

The full story is available on the University website, and was featured this morning by the BBC, Daily Telegraph and Independent.