Animals are Valuable in Behavioral Research :: Behavioral Research Essays

From the dawn of time, when the first sympathetic killed an wildcat for food, or drove it from a fruit patch so that he could eat instead, there has been competition with animals for basic resources. Likewise, over the ages, mankind have contemplated their relationship with animals. Ancestral societies worshipped the animals they used recognizing that the lives they took fueled their make lives. Further introspection on humanitys place in the world resulted in the development of codes of morality and ethics and subsequently the first modern religions. musical composition biblical messs of animals argon primarily those of utility rather than of moral value, archaean scholars argued that animals should be comprehended kindly be agent animal cruelty represented a flawed morality and was ultimately detrimental to the moral development of humans. This view that humans may ultimately be judged based on their manipulation of opposite lives exists to this day, and for many, is a st rong argument for stewardship toward animals.Interestingly, advances in biology that began in the 1800s have provided some of the strongest arguments for imbuing animals with an enhanced moral value. By recognizing that the nervous systems of wholly vertebrate animals are very similar, it is assumed that activities that will lay down a human pain or distress will likewise cause pain or distress to other animals. It is for this reason that current animal use regulations require the use of analgesics, anesthetics and sedatives for any procedures on animals that may cause more than momentary pain or distress. Animal experimentation is an inherent component of biomedical and behavioural research, a critical part of efforts to prevent, cure, and treat a vast range of ailments. As in the past, investigators are utilize animals to learn about the most widespread diseases of the age, including heart disease and cancer, as well as to gain basic knowledge in genetics, physiology, and othe r life sciences. Animals are also needed to combat new diseases, of which aid is currently the most prominent example. As Miller (1985) pointed out in a trenchant defense of animal research in psychology, behavioral research on animals has laid the foundation for breakthroughs in the treatment of dose addiction, anxiety disorders, phobias, urinary incontinence, and ruminative vomiting. At the same time, behavioral researchers are drawing on animal studies to learn more about such major causes of human suffering as mental illness, and senility. Teaching machines and programmed scholarship have evolved out of experimental work on animals (Skinner, 1958) and are creation used to increase the efficiency of instruction by the armed forces and by industry.