YAS-32306 Companion Animals

Course

Credits 6.00

Language of instruction:

English

Assumed knowledge on:

1th and 2nd Year Bachelor Courses Animal Sciences.

Contents:

The course Companion Animals provides you with knowledge on the biological background of companion animal species and how this background impacts the challenges these animals face during their lives as pets. It teaches to discriminate assumptions from scientific facts in matters related to the keeping of pets, and thus trains you to formulate substantiated ways to promote good biological function or, alternatively, identify knowledge gaps.

Learning outcomes:

After successful completion of this course students are expected to:
- understand the biological background and associated species-specific needs, including how domestication has affected these;
- be able to understand how current lifestyle conditions such as environment and nutrition conflict with species-specific needs and result in behavioural, physiological, and / or metabolic challenges sometimes leading to poor welfare;
- be able to analyse the scientific basis for a claim or urban legend, discriminating related facts (knowledge gaps) from fiction regarding keeping of pets;
- be able to apply scientific facts from research on behaviour and training, nutrition, sociality, breeding and genetics, and health and welfare of companion animals.

Activities:

The learning activities are lectures, tutorials, self-study, excursion(s) and case work. In general, each day of the course has a morning session with a lecture and an afternoon session for the case work in groups of ~5 students. Lecture-related scientific articles are provided for self-study.

Examination:

- digital test with mostly multiple choice questions and some open questions (70%);
- group presentation (15%) and individual abstract (15%).
Each component needs a minimal mark of 5.50 to pass.

Literature:

Study-guidelines available with the contact-person.