Internship offer — The study of facial micro-expressions in domestic animals

 (Equus caballus & Canis lupus familiaris)

Description: Micro-expressions have been described in humans as facial movements expressed less than 500 milliseconds. They can be associated with different emotions as disgust, anger, joy, etc. Micro-expressions are not under our voluntary control so these expressions cannot be simulated, which is not the case with long lasting facial expressions (Bhatnagar et al., 2016). It is interesting to analyse them because they could give more precise information about the internal state of an individual. Up to now, micro expressions have been explored a lot in humans but a few in non-human animals. Data collection in horses has been already done during the last spring and the results suggest that non-human animals have micro-expressions.

This internship aims to investigate whether non-human animals have or not some facial micro-expressions, and if they express them according to a socio-cognitive context. More precisely, this research will take place in a human animal interaction context, between an owner and his/her animal, a dog or a horse. The person will participate to the recordings, the data collection and the statistical analysis.

Time: 6 months, between September and March

Requested profile: We are searching for a person in a master’s degree, interested in human-animal relationship, who have some experiences with dogs and/or horses. The person should know how to study animal behaviour, dogs’ and/or horses one preferentially.

Contact: Sophie PELLON, sophie.pellon@ulb.ac.be, Faculty of Medecine, Campus Erasme, Université Libre de Bruxelles (BELGIUM)