Scientists find horses are cleverer than some previously thought

Scientists who wanted to understand more about the way horses learn have found that they are cleverer than previously believed.

Researchers from Nottingham Trent University (NTU) and the University of Central Lancashire developed a task where 20 horses touched a piece of card with their noses to get a treat. They gradually made the task more challenging and assessed how horses reacted.

At the next step, horses would not get a treat if they touched the card while a light was on, but would if they touched it while the light was off. The study found that horses indiscriminately touched the card, regardless of whether the light was on or off, while still being rewarded for all correct responses.

In the final stage, researchers introduced a “penalty” for touching the card when the light was on – giving horses a 10-second timeout, during which they were unable to play the game or receive a reward. Very quickly, there was a significant reduction in errors among all horses involved, as they started to play the game correctly to receive their treat.

The researchers argue that it is possible the horses had understood the game throughout, but had initially found a way to play that meant they did not have to pay much attention. They believe this shows a higher level of intelligence than previously thought possible, as horses were able to switch strategies when the penalty was introduced.

This “model-based” approach requires the horse to think into the future, focus on what they want to achieve and the steps they need to take.

“I’m sure many horse owners and riders may be reading this story and thinking, ‘Of course, we already know horses are clever!’ All three of us who did this research are horse people and we can think of lots of examples from our own experiences of horses demonstrating their emotional intelligence and ability for associative learning,” NTU-based researcher Louise Evans told H&H.

“What we have shown in our study is that horses may be even more cognitively complex than this, by behaving strategically, rather than purely based on association. This is the part that is less commonly seen, rarely evidenced and so interesting to us.”

She added that the fact horses “figured out that their original strategy of touching the target every time was not going to get them very far” once the penalty was introduced is the part they were “really impressed by” as “there has been no previous evidence to show horses had this ability”.

“We definitely don’t want people to take this research to mean that their horse is devious or out to take advantage of them and use that to excuse punishments. That type of behaviour needs a much more complex model of the world and a more complicated sense of self that there is no evidence for in horses,” she said.

“We hope the research can have positive impact though. First, although many horse riders and trainers may have suspected that horses are intelligent, there are still many people arguing that horses have limited cognitive capacities and this unfortunately can lead to poor welfare.

“Second, the horses learnt something quite complicated using only humane training methods, which shows that we can and should train horses in ways that promote good welfare.

“This type of rational thinking is only possible when horses (and humans) feel safe and relaxed, so positive welfare day to day and during training is key to getting the best from our horses. And finally, our study tells us we should all be more open-minded about the abilities of animals, even us scientists!”

Ms Evans added that predator animals, such as dogs, would be expected to have decent ability for model-based learning, as they need to be able to plan ahead to co-operate and ambush larger prey. But flight animals, like horses, don’t rely on this ability to survive in the wild, which is why the study’s results are surprising.

“Whether that makes them more or less intelligent than other species is too difficult to say based on this study alone. To our knowledge this is the first evidence of model-based learning in horses, so we need to do much more research to understand how and why horses might be able to do this,” she said.

Lead researcher Dr Carrie Ijichi added: “It’s fascinating because horses have a very underdeveloped prefrontal cortex, which is what we typically credit with producing that type of thinking in humans.

“This means they must be using another area of the brain to achieve a similar result, and this teaches us that we shouldn’t make assumptions about animal intelligence or sentience based on whether they are ‘built’ just like us.”

The study is published in Applied Animal Behaviour Science.

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