Laura Webb

Background

About Laura Webb

I am passionate about understanding, assessing and promoting positive mental states in farm animals. I did a joint honours degree at the University of Bristol in Zoology and Psychology, which was a fantastic opportunity to study both animal and human behaviour. My BSc thesis with Prof Gareth Jones focused on trying to demonstrate acoustic crypsis in moths. Wanting to have a strong application to my work in ethology I then studied for a MSc degree in applied animal behaviour and welfare at the university of Edinburgh. I did a short thesis on the social behaviour of Diana monkeys at the Edinburgh zoo, and my main thesis on the development of the social bond between mother and young in two breeds of sheep with prof Cathy Dwyer. Following a period as a field/ research assistant first for the University of Stirling (volunteer project on marmoset habituation to a human observer), then in New South Wales (bowerbird behaviour) and finally at the Institute of Neuroscience of Newcastle University (rat judgment bias), I started my PhD at Wageningen University looking at veal calf behaviour, theid feed preferences and motivation. My work has now shifted towards positive mental states, especially the understanding and assessment of these states in non verbal species, drawing inspiration from positive psychology. The range of species I work on includes mainly farmed mammals (calves, cows, fattening pigs, sheep) but I have recently, through student projects, started investigating invertebrates, including insects and bivalves, which I find fascinating.