Operationalising social competence and estimating its genetic and genomic basis to improve the welfare of pigs

Aims:
Our overarching aims are to (i) provide fundamental knowledge on how social behavioural responses, including positive behaviours, measured in diverse social contexts combine to affect welfare in order to operationalise the concept of social competence, and; (ii) to determine the genetic regulation to the social competence phenotype in order to understand its biology and confirm the potential and consequences of selecting for this integrative behavioural trait.