This study addressed the hypothesis that 24-h patterns of behavioural variables of dairy cows for specific periods within a day (i.e., reflecting the 24-h behavioural pattern) are sensitive to increasing daily mean temperature–humidity index (THI) and may provide complementary information to daily mean behavioural variables based on full days. Meteorological data and behavioural sensor data, including lying duration, number of steps and number of postural changes, were retrieved from eight dairy farms. Eighteen behavioural variables were extracted using time windows informed by exploratory analysis across three THI categories. Several 24-h pattern variables reflecting behavioural changes for specific periods in a day had a consistent direction of correlation with the daily mean THI across farms on days with and/or without pasture access. For the daily mean variables, only the daily mean lying duration had a consistent direction of correlation with daily mean THI across farms on days without pasture access, and no daily mean variables had a consistent direction of correlation with daily mean THI across farms on days with pasture access. Generalized additive mixed models indicated that relationships between behavioural variables and daily mean THI were nonlinear. For most behavioural variables, the daily mean THI ranges in which the behavioural variables changed differed between days with and without pasture access. Some of the 24-h pattern behavioural variables exhibited a wider daily mean THI range with significant behavioural change than the daily mean variables. In conclusion, some of the variables derived from the 24-h behavioural pattern were highly sensitive to daily mean THI and could complement daily mean variables in the detection of heat stress. Dairy cows had more behavioural changes in response to increasing THI on days with pasture access than on days without pasture access.

This article examines the development and transformation of school colonies within the Italian child welfare system between the First World War and the immediate postwar period. Originally conceived as prophylactic institutions aimed at strengthening the bodies of frail and undernourished children, these colonies gradually assumed broader functions, becoming spaces shaped by new political and social imperatives. The article focuses on the impact of wartime mobilisation, the reconfiguration of welfare networks involving public authorities, voluntary organisations, and humanitarian agencies, as well as the growing role of doctors and teachers in structuring the daily life of these institutions. In particular, the text analyses how health prevention practices became intertwined with moral education and forms of political mobilisation. The result is a complex picture that highlights the emergence of a hybrid model which anticipated the subsequent welfare and educational policies of Fascist totalitarian pedagogy.

This article empirically tests whether social investment strategies foster citizen capacitation, in ways that improve well-being and generate micro-level policy feedback, reflected in trust and satisfaction with welfare caseworkers. Between 2018 and 2022, 816 social assistance recipients participated in a Dutch, controlled longitudinal experiment. Participants were randomly assigned to: (1) social investment with proactive caseworker support; (2) self-direction with autonomy to decide if, when, and how to engage with caseworkers; or (3) workfare (control group) with standard municipal protocols. Key findings show positive, significant effects on caseworker satisfaction under social investment, alongside marginal significant effects on trust. We find no substantial effects on well-being. A significant negative effect in the self-direction group during the final wave only appeared after controlling for covariates. While recipients value a more supportive relationship with their caseworker, which partially translates into increased trust, it remains insufficient to counteract the weight of structural barriers for well-being.

Many claim that there is an important relationship between consciousness and welfare. Call this general view phenomenalism. One way of fleshing out phenomenalism is to hold that consciousness is what makes one the type of entity that can be noninstrumentally better or worse off in the first place. Consciousness is at least a necessary condition on welfare subjecthood. A different account holds that even if consciousness is not necessary for welfare subjecthood, conscious welfare subjects have a greater welfare capacity. We argue that the most likely source of support for either version of phenomenalism – hedonism about welfare goods and bads – provides no support at all. Along the way, we discuss an alternative view of welfare subjectivity and welfare capacity that does not appeal to consciousness but only to mentality, a view we call mentalism.

Why do poor caregivers resist rights-based framings of their situation even when directly exposed to institutionalized rights discourses? Drawing on 44 in-depth interviews with caregivers, care recipients, and officials from Chile Cuida, a state assistance program grounded in the right-to-care framework, this article examines the rights consciousness of long-term, intensive caregivers in Santiago, Chile. We find that, despite significant political exposure to rights discourses, caregivers consistently frame their experiences in terms of familial duty rather than entitlement. Building on rights-consciousness literature, we identify three mechanisms that explain this pattern: cultural incompatibility, whereby caregivers resist framings that appear to contradict familial obligations; familial overspilling, whereby family-based relational expectations are projected onto bureaucratic actors; and bridging strategies, whereby caregivers invoke alternative cultural sources of entitlement – particularly notions of state duty toward the poor – to justify receiving assistance without challenging familial dominance. We argue that discursive exposure to rights frameworks is insufficient when it confronts deeply settled familial cultural repertoires, with significant implications for care policy in the region.

It is widely held that theories of well-being must satisfy the criterion of descriptive adequacy. According to the criterion, an adequate theory of well-being must optimally fit our everyday experiences and judgments relating to well-being. This article argues that there is no such criterion that constrains theories of well-being. First, it examines in detail the reasons for which the criterion was originally introduced. Second, it argues against the criterion, on the grounds that well-being is essentially normative and normative theories more generally are not subject to any such constraint. Third, it considers two objections relating to reflective equilibrium and thick normative concepts. Finally, it explores the implications of rejecting the criterion for evaluating theories of well-being and for integrating the philosophy and science of well-being. A positive lesson of the article is that taking the normativity of well-being seriously from a meta-ethical perspective has implications for first-order theorizing about well-being.

This study investigated the annual culling rate and its main causes on dairy farms in the central region of Santa Fe, Argentina. A cross-sectional study was conducted between February and April 2025 on 77 farms located in the central dairy region of Santa Fe province, Argentina (Castellanos and Las Colonias departments). On each farm, an in-person survey was conducted with the farm manager. Information was collected regarding the farm demographics, the number of culls and mortalities and the causes of culling. The average annual total culling rate for pasture-based systems was 22.3% (range: 10–34%), while for confined systems it was 31% (range: 22–54%). The proportion of cows culled in pasture-based systems was 15.6% (range: 2–30%) compared to 23.6% (range: 14–43%) in confined systems. The annual mortality rate in pasture-based systems was 6.7% (range: 2–20%), while in confined systems it was 7.4% (range: 4–17%). The main causes of culling were reproductive problems, udder health issues, hoof diseases, infectious diseases and low milk production. The main causes of mortality on the farms were traumatic injuries, infectious diseases, mastitis and metabolic disorders, among others. Average cow longevity in pasture-based systems was 4.3 (range: 2–9) lactations compared to 2.9 (range: 1.4–4) lactations in confined systems. Productivity, animal welfare and dairy herd longevity are shaped primarily by management practices rather than by production system type alone, and both pasture-based and confined systems can be optimized to achieve sustainable outcomes.

Domestic cats (Felis catus) are favoured companion animals, but also highly effective predators that have caused substantial declines and extinctions of native fauna in many places where they have been introduced. In Australia, free-roaming pet cats kill hundreds of millions of native animals annually, contributing to one of the world’s most severe modern extinction crises. In response, policy, advocacy and public messaging has increasingly promoted responsible pet cat management, including containment, on the multiple grounds of biodiversity protection, public amenity, disease spread reduction, and benefits to cat health and welfare. A recent article by Glanville C, Hampton JO, and Sandøe P 2025 Calling a trade-off a trade-off in arguments for cat confinement. Animal Welfare 34: e65. https://doi.org/10.1017/awf.2025.10041. challenges this messaging, arguing that claiming welfare benefits from cat containment is wilfully or negligently misleading. Here, we respond to four central arguments advanced by Glanville et al. We argue that separating physical health from welfare is conceptually flawed; that containment, like free-roaming, involves welfare pros and cons to cats (and their prey) that must all be evaluated concurrently; that privileging a cat’s freedom to roam ignores the welfare and rights of the animals harmed by roaming cats; and that allegations of “bad faith” or deceptive messaging by containment advocates are unfounded and unhelpful. While acknowledging that containment requires enriched care from cat owners, any uncertainty regarding relative welfare outcomes of containment versus free-roaming for cats does not justify ignoring the clear and severe welfare and conservation harms imposed on other animals by free-roaming cats. In Australia, pet cat containment remains a pragmatic pathway that aligns conservation objectives with overall animal welfare.

Specialised AI hardware becomes economically obsolete much faster than conventional capital, so maintaining a given stock of compute requires high replacement investment. This paper studies the implications for growth, adjustment dynamics, and policy in a two-asset growth model in which AI capacity both raises productivity and produces digital services at low marginal cost. Calibrated to advanced economies, the model delivers two distinct adjustment speeds. AI capacity reverts relatively quickly, with a half-life of about seven quarters, while conventional capital adjusts over roughly a decade. When hardware is short-lived, even modest changes in gross spending can produce large swings in measured AI investment, despite only limited movements in the underlying stock. This helps explain the volatility often seen in specialised AI hardware investment cycles. Hardware durability also has first-order welfare effects. In the baseline calibration, a two-percentage-point fall in quarterly depreciation raises welfare by 0.36% in consumption-equivalent terms, while an equal-sized compute tax reduces the steady-state AI stock by around one-fifth.

Weaning is a significant event in the life of Sahiwal calves, often leading to notable behavioural and emotional changes. This study aimed to investigate the effects of dam–calf contact on behavioural responses and adaptability in Sahiwal calves, focusing on fear responses, social interactions and reactivity to humans. A total of 16 newborn calves were assigned to 2 rearing systems: fenceline mother-calf contact (FMC) and separated mother-calf (SM), with 8 calves in each group. The FMC group received natural suckling and fenceline contact with their dams, while the SM group was separated at birth and fed via nipple bottles. Behavioural assessments were conducted through a series of tests, including social reactivity tests, social preference tests, umbrella-based fear elicitation and interaction with a familiar human. Key behavioural parameters such as time spent idle, exploratory behaviour, escape attempts, vocalizations, latency to resume feeding and preference for conspecifics or humans were recorded. Data were statistically analysed using independent t-tests to compare behavioural responses between groups. The results revealed distinct behavioural differences between the FMC and SM calves, indicating that dam contact influences social behaviour, reduces fearfulness and improves calves’ adaptability to novel or stressful situations.