Refinement Database

Database on Refinement of Housing, Husbandry, Care, and Use of Animals in Research

This database, created in 2000, is updated every four months with newly published scientific articles, books, and other publications related to improving or safeguarding the welfare of animals used in research.

Tips for using the database:

  • This landing page displays all of the publications in the database.
  • Use the drop-down menus to filter these publications by Animal Type, Setting, and/or Topic.
  • Clicking on a parent category (e.g., Rodent) will include publications relating to all the items in that category (e.g., Chinchilla, Gerbil, Guinea Pig, etc.).
  • You may also add a keyword to further narrow your search.
  • Please note that at this time, only publications dated 2010 or later (with some exceptions) can be filtered by Animal Type and Topic, and only publications dated 2020 or later (with some exceptions) can be filtered by Setting. Most publications older than 2010 can only be searched by keyword. 

Completely updated and revised, and with a new author team, this second edition of Farm Animal Behaviour continues to provide essential information on normal and stereotypic behaviors in a wide variety of farm animals to...

Many dairy cows in the developed world are now housed exclusively indoors with fewer than 5% of the 10 million lactating cows in the United States having access to pasture during the grazing season. Indoor...

The degree to which the relatively smaller area of artificial environments (compared with natural habitats) has measureable effects on the behavior and welfare of captive animals has been debated for many years. While there is...

Cows on two separate farms were submitted to a 6 d preference test, repeated four times, consisting of three 2 d phases (3 h d−1 phase−1): forced-indoor, forced-outdoor, and free-choice. A majority of cows on...

Primates are notable for having a rich and detailed understanding of their social environment and there has been great interest in the evolution and function of social knowledge in primates. Indeed, primates have been shown...

Despite growing interest in promoting positive welfare, rather than just alleviating poor welfare, potential measures of good welfare, and means to provide it, have remained elusive. In humans social support improves stress-coping abilities, health, and...

The Guide for the Care and Use of Animals and the USDA Animal Welfare Regulations (AWR) outline minimum space requirements for laboratory animals, including rabbits. These documents encourage housing of animals in enclosures that allow...

Bonobos are known for their pacifistic behavior and their large repertoire of behaviors that are thought to serve conflict resolution. One is an unusual form of ventro-ventral mounting that facilitates genital contacts (GC). Various hypotheses...

The report sets out how to provide: optimal enclosure characteristicsand size; social housing; solid flooring and substrate; raised areas; refuges; gnawing objects and dietary enrichment; positive interaction with humans; toys and objects to manipulate; for...

Enrichment has been known to increase the well being and species typical behavior of captive animals. While much research has been done on the effectiveness of enrichment or captive monkeys and apes, research on enrichment...

Consolation is a triadic postconflict interaction between a conflict participant and an uninvolved third party. We tested whether consolation alleviates postconflict stress in captive chimpanzees, Pan troglodytes. In addition, we examined whether consolation is a...

An ethological understanding of a behavioral phenomenon incorporates four levels of explanation: development, mechanism, function, and evolution. The phenomenon of socially-mediated learning has garnered a great deal of attention from ethologists, prominently including primatologists. Gregarious...

The chimpanzee is the only representative of the Great Apes that is extensively involved in biomedical research in primate laboratories. These apes are used as animal models in a variety of studies, including research on...

Their tendency toward natural behavior is probably little changed from their wild counterparts, despite the overwhelming influence of captivity on behavior... From a chimpanzee's point of view, it would be better to stimulate behavior characteristics...

A semi-natural habitat that was designed to house a group of squirrel monkeys is described. Animals maintained in this environment were healthy, and none of the animals exhibited locomotor stereotypies. This facility was easier and...

When forage materials [chicken scratch] are provided, bedding materials, such as straw or shredded newspaper, along with woodchips increase the amount of time the captive chimpanzee spends in search of forage materials. ... Whether this...

Food sharing has been proposed as the propeller of hominid evolution, particularly of the development of systems of mutual social obligation. Yet, food sharing in our closest relative has never been subjected to a rigorous...

The social behavior of a semi-wild cattle herd was described and analysed covering a 2-year observation period. In cattle husbandry, livestock should be only kept in such systems that meet the species-specific social needs of...

A heavy metal cylinder, 60 cm long and 45 cm in diameter, was capped on each end and bolted to a platform. Three 8 cm holes in the cylinder allowed access to the inside. A...

Chimpanzees readily use tools in most intelligent ways to retrieve food items.