Welfare biology

Welfare biology is a proposed interdisciplinary field that studies the well-being of sentient beings in relation to their environment. The concept was first introduced by economist Yew-Kwang Ng in 1995, who defined it as the scientific study of living organisms and their surroundings with respect to their welfare, understood as the balance of enjoyment and suffering. Since then, the idea has been developed by researchers across disciplines including biology, welfare economics, animal ethics, and philosophy. A central motivation for the field is its potential to inform responses to wild animal suffering, with proponents arguing that it could provide a scientific foundation for assessing and improving the lives of nonhuman animals, particularly those outside human control. Suggested research directions include the use of demographic and ecological data to evaluate welfare outcomes, while a proposed subdiscipline, urban welfare ecology, focuses on animals living in urban, suburban, and industrial environments.