Research at the University of Vienna.
Many things are part of everyday knowledge, so to speak – but scientific evidence is still not easy. This applies to a study with cows that researchers at the University of Vienna have now published in the specialist magazine Frontiers in Psychology. The result: cows relax when they are petted and hear a soft voice. The effect was therefore clearer when the voice came directly from the person next to the cow and not from a loudspeaker on the researcher’s body.
Every pet owner, or probably every empathetic person, would have said something similar: Cuddling is nice, and a trusting voice too. Text from tape is not the same. “Perhaps farmers are ridiculed when they talk to their cows, but it actually has an effect,” says Annika Lange from the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna. Animal welfare research is also about enabling animals to have a better life. However, it is more difficult to measure happiness than stress. This is probably not only the case with cows.
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