Article in The Atlantic - Do horses know what they’re doing when they compete?

[Tha_Ridge]

Well, the 4-year-old who had been to a whopping one horse show, just to school—and mind you, was a very good boy, told another horse that he had "won lots of things that day.

My 16-year-old jumper schoolmaster told me when he was first imported that all he needed was to know the course and how many horses he had to beat and he was on it. And I’ll be damned, he was right as long as I didn’t screw it up. We also have it well-documented but the horse’s breathing would change after the jump-off buzzer. My trainer said he knew that once the buzzer went off and the horse started blowing in-step, he knew it was a lock.

My current mare, an 8-year-old who has jumped through 1.30m in Europe with no signs of being limited there, said that I personally, with my riding, will never reach the limits of her athletic ability. You have to basically get on her jockey-style at the show, while at home, she stands like a school pony — she definitely knows when she’s going to the ring.

[Libby2563]

Thanks for the gift link! I agree the article has some problematic elements, but some of the linked studies are very interesting.

https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsbl.2015.0907

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0960982218303646

Unwilling or willing but unable: can horses interpret human actions as goal...

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-47960-5

[OverandOnward]

@Tha_Ridge

Well, the 4-year-old who had been to a whopping one horse show, just to school—and mind you, was a very good boy, told another horse that he had "won lots of things that day.

My 16-year-old jumper schoolmaster told me when he was first imported that all he needed was to know the course and how many horses he had to beat and he was on it. And I’ll be damned, he was right as long as I didn’t screw it up. We also have it well-documented but the horse’s breathing would change after the jump-off buzzer. My trainer said he knew that once the buzzer went off and the horse started blowing in-step, he knew it was a lock.

My current mare, an 8-year-old who has jumped through 1.30m in Europe with no signs of being limited there, said that I personally, with my riding, will never reach the limits of her athletic ability. You have to basically get on her jockey-style at the show, while at home, she stands like a school pony — she definitely knows when she’s going to the ring.

Actually … this is fairly consistent with things I’ve pretty sure my horses have said to me.

Most horses are capable of doing far more than they are ever asked to do by humans. They are very powerful animals and we use only part of that. So, your mare is probably right, with no disrespect to your riding at all!

Long ago, my jumper insisted on watching keenly while the course was reset for the jump off. I swear he figured out the new route, just looking. He was never surprised by anything in the jump off.

As for the 4 yo … When my OTTB went to his first-ever horse show just to visit, just walking in hand with no chance to ride him there as I knew he had never seen anything like that, he started out totally overwhelmed and rocked back by all of the shenanigans and the everything going on. Bug-eyed at the jumping. But he settled down during the day to graze near the ring, relaxed. And then came home convinced that HE had been somewhere the equivalent of a moon landing. He had a whole new demeanor of stature, wisdom and professionalism, having gone, returned, survived. Been there, done that.

So I easily believe that your 4 yo visted a show just to school and came home convinced that he had champed the whole show. I mean, of course he did, right?

[Tha_Ridge]

This post made my smile… Agree with every word! They may not understand or observe things in the same way that we do, but they are far more sentient and observant than non-horse people give them credit for. (And, yes, infinitely grateful for my mare who is convinced that I will be unable to challenge her with all sorts of bad riding! )

[OverandOnward]

I also appreciate a horse who messages “I am doing this, just don’t fall off – and don’t tell me how to do my job”.

[blue_heron]

This is my young horse exactly, since day one of being backed. Love the attitude.

The article is mostly stupid-- it reads like an article written by someone who has no experience with horses, which I think is true.

[sami-joe]

Not going to review the piece’s mix of positions. I don’t take offense at someone trying to see into a racehorse’s head, though.

What the university studies on our fellow domesticates show more and more that we all, dogs and horses especially, have what we might call empathy, what some scholars call elements of a Theory of Mind, among and between our species. The Atlantic writer lays them out in the fifth paragraph: cooperation, problem-solving, and emotion recognition.

For centuries, these were believed to apply to humans only, then scientists tried for decades to reproduce similar results in other primates – mostly a bust. When researchers began to focus on the hallmarks of domestication, both phenotypes and genotypes, we see what one scientist, Duke Professor Brian Hare, calls “Survival of the Friendliest.” (His book by this name has some problems, but it tells a broadly intuitive tale of what domestication really is and how it has ensured dogs’ place at our hearths.)

While this is far from a perfect piece, the kicker demanding equine self-awareness is just dumb – my horse is more self-aware than I am by a longshot – the fact that the studies quoted indicate that horses and humans have likely cooperated in some fashion for thousands, even tens of thousands of years matters to me, and I like that a broadly read, general audience outlet ran it.

(I’m so old, I almost called it a magazine.)

[OverandOnward]

@sami-joe

“Survival of the Friendliest.”

I love that !!! So spot on.

The saga of dogs and humans is something amazing. There were “wild” dogs of various phenotypes long before humans domesticated dogs. There are still “wild” dogs in various parts of the world, now referred to by those who study them as “village dogs”. Either because humans do not keep dogs as pets, or because humans view having many ‘strays’ as normal.

It’s fascinating that both never-domesticated dogs and escapee-strays generally choose to be feral, living alongside and scavenging from humans, even if not living with humans.

The “friendliest” strategy of survival is just so fascinating in the transformation over time of the earliest free-roaming dogs that had never been pets, to thoroughly domesticated, human-bred dogs. Domestic dogs as we think of them in Western society, with some sort of breed or mixed-breed identity.

[sami-joe]

Two recent pieces along these lines, one general and one specific to racing that has its own thread over on the Racing side of CoTH:

I don’t know why, for some, this has been such a struggle to understand.

Insects and Other Animals May Have Consciousness

And a NYT doc on the present and future of racing, “Broken Horses.” Three regulars over on the CoTH Racing side of things here seem to distrust the Times and the reporter who has been working on a series about TB breakdowns for at least a year. I don’t see that they’ve watched the doc. It’s on Hulu.

From Majesty to Frailty: Why Are So Many Horses Breaking Down?

[xeroxchick]

All this, the herd sensitivity, makes me also think they know when they are being admired. They sense a regard and can puff up/ get flashy. It’s like a remnant of herd regard. I’ve felt horses do this. I also think they know when all eyes are on them. Some really rise to that, some get freaked out.

[Hidden_Oak]

The “elite” (define as you will ) definitley recognize when they have performed well and love doing their job. No 5* eventer for example will get around XC without a certain amount of, dare I call it ego for doing their job well?

[IronDame]

My yearling definitely enjoys showing off when new people are watching him!

[OverandOnward]

That is something I think I have noticed in horses. They like being admired! It even seems to mean a lot to at least some of them.

Why would they notice that? How would they understand what that means? I think that goes back to the herd mentality. They notice and evaluate each other – I think that’s very clear to anyone who watches herd dynamics. It’s especially apparent when horses are in close quarter settings and don’t have much space from each other, maybe less obvious when they are spread out in pasture. They know that they themselves are being noticed and evaluated by other horses, and also by humans. They are sensitive to what that means for their own status and priority for good things.

I don’t think they know that they have an attractive blaze and socks. But I do think they know that humans look at them, and they know that a human is responding positively while looking, making appreciative mouth noises. From a horse point of view that is likely to mean benefits coming their way.

That’s my theory. Horses really do seem to warm to positive attention from humans as well as from other horses, and it makes sense that positive attention is likely to mean benefits, now and in the future.

Re competition, people shower positive attention and benefits on horses just after a big accomplishment. Of course horses would notice that and enjoy it. And perhaps learn to notice the difference when that doesn’t happen. And of course animals are keen experts on associating the surroundings and events when there is a good, or not-good, outcome, over and over.

[sami-joe]

There is plenty of research that horses can read human expression, both facial and full-body. We know this as horsepeople. The bigger question is why?
Are they on the defense, worried that we’re planning to eat them, or are they trying to understand our plans so they can join in? The latter is more or less how researchers at Duke University define “Theory of Mind,” i.e. the way humans at work on a project can often seemingly automatically cooperate and fill in the blanks to accomplish a common goal. While the Duke lab’s focus is largely on dogs and primates, I’m guessing it’s only a matter of time before the universities studying horse-human connections publish similar work.