Inside the mind of a horse.

[Irish Independent Article]

From Farming Supplement July 25th 2007.

www.independent.ie/farming/inside-the-mind-of-a-horse-
1043162.html

[full article]

Inside the mind of a horse
By DR JACK MURPHY
Tuesday July 24 2007


Horses, like humans are social animals -- probably why both parties get on so well together in the first place. This is also why some horses that are kept in isolation -- stabled alone away from companions -- are often more inclined to develop behavioural problems compared to group housed horses or free-roaming equids.


Indeed, anyone who has witnessed or experienced separation anxiety -- in humans or horses -- knows only too well just how important it is for both species to have access to companionship.

Experimental research has shown that mutual grooming -- where horses stand side-by-side and scratch each other's body in the area just in front of the withers -- has the effect of relaxing the horse and even lowers heart rates.

This particular activity appears to strengthen the bond between companion animals and may well be the best place for a handler to reward any horse for some desired behaviour or response.

Learning

The learning mechanisms of horses are similar to those of humans.

Just like humans, horses are quick on the uptake when exposed to trial and error learning -- learning the right reaction through a reward system, they are very talented in terms of classical conditioning -- learning associations between certain stimuli, cues or aids and they are masters at habituation -- getting used to things.

The horse can also learn to generalise in terms of subtle differences in stimuli, alterations or slight variations in aids or cues and they can even learn categories of things -- based on similar physical characteristics.

However, experimental work to-date seems to indicate that while horses are capable of forming categories, there is no evidence that they can actually develop abstract concepts -- this is a critical difference between humans and horses.

In simple terms, learning in any species is the modification of the internal behavioural organisation of the particular species -- and this essentially depends on the reinforcing properties or experience of the particular species' environment. In short, learning represents changes in an animal's behaviour resulting from experience of some condition or set of circumstances.

Psychological

From a psychological perspective, learning can be sub-divided into three broad forms that might be considered important in relation to general training and learning procedures -- a good understanding of these forms of learning will make working with and training the horse both easier and more appropriate.

The broad forms include: (i) non-associative learning, typically habituation and sensitisation -- where the horse learns to accept tack, rider etc,

(ii) associative learning or conditioning -- where the horse learns the signals for stop, go and turn etc, and

(iii) complex learning or insight -- currently there is very little evidence to suggest that the horse has this level of learning.

Trial and error

What people often erroneously consider as examples of higher-order reasoning in their horses, generally are little more than excellent examples of trial and error learning.

The pony that fiddles with the door latch and learns to open it and escape from the stable is a typical example -- it's very clever, but it is not reasoning on the part of the pony.

In the same way, horses learn within equitation where they simply learn to avoid pressure from the reins, rider seat and legs so as to give the correct response, originally learned by trial and error.

Observational learning of some novel behaviour has long been considered indicative of higher mental processing or levels of reasoning.

This form of learning requires an animal to have the ability to 'see and remember the behavioural sequence' so that they themselves could actually rehearse the novel act within their own mind and then subsequently imitate it for themselves.

The novelty aspect is very important because all animals are instinctively able to copy a behaviour that is already 'hard-wired' into their brains -- in other words something that is naturally part of their behavioural repertoire. Contagious behaviour is initiated as a result of an instinctive triggering device.

Everyone is well aware that when seeing someone else yawn, the observer is almost always inclined to yawn too -- it's just the same with the horse!

Contagious mimicking of instinctive behaviour is adaptive and so when one horse moves, trots, eats, or performs rolling behaviour others are often compelled to do so as well.

Curiously perhaps, unlike chimps, gorillas and dolphins, horses cannot recognise themselves in a mirror.

Furthermore the horse is a poor performer at seeing a detour -- like going further away from the desired goal such as along a fence line to get to a gateway to access things like a water hole or companions.

However, once they have managed to access the appropriate route, they are very quick to remember the path.

It is very likely that the horse is unable to do these type of activities without first learning and subsequently remembering 'how' -- simply because these mental abilities were not required in the evolution of their natural behaviours.

The horse has an excellent memory and, in some respects, the horse's memory is even better than the human equivalent.

Lifetime memory

Horses can remember specific activities and reactions without actually practising a specific behaviour, for many years at least and this probably in reality extends to a full lifetime.

Human memory tends to be affected by recall and reasoning abilities, whereas the equine memory tends to be more stable -- most likely because it is unclouded by reflective thinking and analytical processes.

It is also highly likely that the horse only ever retrieves specific memories of events and/or places when the animal is confronted once again with the original or similar stimuli to the first instance.

Essentially, this makes for a much clearer and more accurate memory and every horse owner is only too well aware of the fact that the horse knows if there is something even slightly different in its immediate environment -- such as a plastic bag on a hedgerow that was not there on a previous hacking out exercise.

Unfortunately and often to the detriment of training within equitation, the horse will remember much more than the rider as to what happened and the horse will invariably remember tension and fear better than anything else -- so these phenomena should always be avoided for optimal learning in the horse.