Have you ever noticed that the colour of a chicken’s face changes with their mood? Did you know how chickens also have emotions?Just like human beings, chickens’ facial colour can speak about their emotions. According to reports, this is their way of expressing their feelings. Their faces tend to turn deep red when they are distressed. A study by an INRAE research team confirmed this fact, opening up new ways of understanding the behavioural patterns of the chickens. Like several other animals and birds, chickens also experience emotions, ranging from happiness and excitement to sadness and fear. Their style of expressing their feelings is very different. Their facial colour indicates their feeling. When a chicken is relaxed or happy, their facial colour changes to light pink.
This phenomenon is caused due to the blood flow that takes place in accordance with their emotions. The change can be observed because the skin around their face is very sensitive. When chickens experience sadness or fear, the blood flow to facial areas increases significantly turning the face to dark red. Similarly, when they are relaxed their blood flow remains normal, which turns their face to light pink.
A number of Sussex hens, aged between three to four months, were taken to conduct the study. These chickens were kept in a 363 m2 grove located in the Loire Valley, France and were observed and filmed over a timespan of three weeks. They were kept in various situations like distributing adequate food or trying to capture them in order to observe the change in reactions in accordance to the type of situation. The research was also performed on two other breeds of chicken. Around 18000 photos were selected for further use in a computer program the experts developed to identify the profiles of the chicken and extract them automatically. With the help of some imagery software, the researchers measured the levels of redness of their facial skin in accordance with their emotions and feelings.
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