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Interspecific communication from people to horses (Equus ferus caballus) is influenced by different horsemanship training styles

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  • The ability of many domesticated animals to follow human pointing gestures to locate hidden food has led to scientific debate on the relative importance of domestication and individual experience on the origins and development of this capacity. To further explore this question we examined the influence of different prior training histories/methods on the ability of horses (Equus ferus caballus) to follow a momentary distal point. Ten horses previously trained using one of two methods (Parelli Natural Horsemanship or traditional horse training) were tested using a standard object choice task. The results show that neither group of horses was able to follow the momentary distal point initially. However, after more experience with the point, horses previously trained using Parelli’s Natural Horsemanship method learned to follow momentary distal points significantly faster than those previously trained with traditional methods. The poor initial performance of horses on distal pointing tasks, coupled with the finding that prior training history and experimental experience can lead to success on this task, fails to support the predictions of the Domestication Hypothesis, and instead lends support to the Two-Stage Hypothesis.
  • This is an author's peer-reviewed final manuscript, as accepted by the publisher. The published article is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association and can be found at: http://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/com/ This article may not exactly replicate the final version published in the APA journal. It is not the copy of record.
  • Keywords: Momentary distal point, Object-choice task, Parelli Natural Horsemanship, Social cognition, Traditional horse training, Learning, Equus ferus caballus
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  • Dorey, N. R., Conover, A. M., & Udell, M. A. R. (2014). Interspecific communication from people to horses (Equus ferus caballus) is influenced by different horsemanship training styles. Journal of Comparative Psychology, 128(4), 337-342. doi:10.1037/a0037255
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  • 128
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  • 4
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