Featured Article
How Horses Learn
by Karin Apfel | 2010 Canadian Horse AnnualA recent survey of over 200 coaches registered with Australia’s National Coaches
Accreditation Scheme surprised researchers with how little many of them
knew about how horses actually learn. Most, in fact, were unable to explain how to use positive or negative reinforcement when training. Less than 3% properly described how to use positive reinforcement to train horses and only 12% of coaches gave an accurate description of using negative reinforcement. Only 5% correctly explained punishment. The study’s authors, Amanda K.Warren-Smith and Paul D. McGreevy, of the Faculty of Veterinary Science at the University of Sydney, assert that the wellbeing of horses, their response to training and
the incidence of behaviour problems could be improved by coaches becoming better
educated.
So what does that mean for the average owner/rider? Do we need to take a University psychology or animal behaviour course in order to evaluate our training
regime or that of our professional trainer or coach? No, but a little information will help you ensure that your horse is getting the most from his training. In her 2005 submission on Equine Learning Ability at the American Association of Equine
Practitioners Convention, Dr. Evelyn B. Hanggi, MS, PhD, cofounder of the Equine
Research Foundation (ERF) in Aptos, California, stated, “If the cognitive abilities of horses are misunderstood, underrated, or overrated, their treatment may also be inappropriate. Equine welfare is dependent on not only physical comfort, but mental comfort as well.” In other words, if we understand how a horse processes information we can avoid stress and confusion and we can facilitate the learning process.
The Science of Learning
A functional definition of learning is a process that brings together cognitive,
emotional, and environmental influences and experiences (stimuli) for acquiring,
enhancing, or making changes in behaviour. There are a number of ways for animals
to learn. The main ways are listed below.
Habituation: This is the simplest form of learning. It is “getting used” to something; responding less and less to a stimulus because it has no meaning to the individual until it is disregarded. For example, horses pastured near roads learn to disregard the sounds of traffic. Alternatively, animals can also habituate to pain or discomfort such as the feeling of a girth. Habituation can also cause problems. For example, the hard-mouthed horse has learned to ignore even severe bit action due to being unable to escape the discomfort of the bit in a poor rider’s hands. Bit aids no longer have any meaning to this horse so there is not response.
Observational learning: There is little evidence that horses can learn specific actions from watching another horse. However, as social animals, horses can and do learn to fear or disregard certain stimuli based on the behaviour of other horses. This kind of learning mostly affects instinctive behaviours such as grazing or fleeing predators. If one horse in a herd flees from dogs, it is likely that the rest will learn to “fear” dogs as well.
Desensitization: Extinguishing a response to a formerly unpleasant or
frightening stimulus by gradually developing a tolerance or acceptance
of it. An example is using treats and a gradual exposure to syringes to help a
horse overcome a fear of injections. The treats act as a “counter-conditioner”
that changes the horse’s emotions (through classical conditioning – see
below). When the fearful emotions change for the better, the undesirable
behaviour fades away.
Classical (Pavlovian)
Conditioning: This is a process in which an animal learns to associate
some non-significant stimulus with one that generates an emotional response,
for example, associating the sight of a syringe with food. This kind of learning
affects the way an animal “feels” and this change in emotion will influence
the animal’s behaviour.
Operant (Skinnerian)
Conditioning: This is the learning process in which most training occurs
as it is based on consequences. There are two types of consequences that
affect behaviour: reinforcement and punishment. A reinforcer is anything
that fulfils a need at the time and a punisher is anything that an organism
will work to avoid. In OC, the horse believes he has control over the outcome
of an event. For example, he can learn to move to relieve the pressure
of a leg squeeze. “Operant conditioning is a horse training standard,” says
Hangii, “and negative reinforcement has been the primary means of shaping behaviours. Horses are typically trained to perform actions in order to avoid
something aversive.”
Reinforcement and Punishment
Punishment (positive and negative) is used to reduce the incidence or strength of a behaviour that it follows. Reinforcement (positive and negative) increases the incidence or strength of a behaviour that it follows. Positive refers to adding something to the situation and negative refers to removing something. Below are examples.
Positive Punishment: You bump the horse across the nose with a chain lead if he surges out ahead when you are leading him.
Negative Punishment: You do not allow the horse to enter the paddock if he does not lead well towards it.
Positive Reinforcement: Giving a horse a treat for standing quietly for saddling will increase quiet behaviour.
Negative Reinforcement: When a horse backs up in response to your hand pressing on his chest, you release the pressure and this will increase the chance of him backing up next time you touch his chest.
How well these consequences are applied determines how quickly and thoroughly an animal learns to acquire or change a behaviour. Timing and consistency are extremely important for the horse to make the correct associations between any action and the consequence.
Most horses are trained largely through negative reinforcement and positive punishment. This is in marked contrast to the training of zoo animals and, increasingly, dogs in which determining ways to reward the animal for performance
(positive reinforcement) is the primary teaching tool. Dr. Hanggi notes that training for research purposes is primarily based on positive reinforcement. “Positive reinforcement teaches the horse to become an active participant seeking the right answer,” explains Hanggi. The horse is not afraid to try new things because there are no unpleasant consequences for guessing “wrong” – there is just no paycheque. Studies have shown that both negative and positive reinforcement work well with horses but there are individual preferences. While one approach may work well with one horse it may not work as well with another so it is useful
to know how to apply both.
Clarifying Positive Reinforcement
There is more to positive reinforcement than handing a horse some treats. Misunderstanding how positive reinforcement works can lead to confusion. Let us consider the horse kicking in anticipation of a grain feeding. This may spring from excitement at first but if the person feeding hurries to feed the horse in an attempt to get him to stop the behaviour, the kicking will have been positively reinforced by the food immediately following the kicking. Soon the sound of feed hitting a bucket or even the appearance of the person who feeds can become the prompt for a bout of kicking. The horse believes that getting fed is a result of his kicking.
Alternatively, riders may use praise or patting to try to reinforce behaviour. Although it is possible that a horse may find either of these things pleasant, they are not naturally reinforcing to a horse (touching and oral communication
are common in primates not ungulates). In fact, patting and praise rarely operate well as a teaching tool unless they have become associated with a rest or break in activity and are, therefore, acting as a signal that something reinforcing
(stretching, relaxing) is on its way. This is a form of classical conditioning. Patting or praise may be far more successful as reinforcers during a riding workout than in the barn for, say, standing quietly for the clippers (given that the horse is already resting) as long as they are frequently precursors
for something the animal does value.
Food is a very powerful reinforcer in training but a common concern is that using it will create a horse that bites or “mugs” for the reward. This is actually a delivery problem rather than a treat problem. A good rule of thumb is to keep
your hand closed until it is where you want your horse’s head to be. Extend your hand away from your body to keep the horse from crowding. If your horse gets too pushy, just step out of range. Working with a barrier (stall guard or
fence) to start with can help.
Making it Work
The most important lesson to take away is that if you or your trainer are doing something to change or teach a behaviour and it is not working, stop! Horses, like all other animals do what works for them. They either get something beneficial out of an action or they avoid something unpleasant. Let’s take kicking at feeding time as an example. It is working for the horse, right? The horse has determined that the kicking will produce food more quickly. Punishing the kicker rarely works in this situation for a number of reasons and may actually cause the horse to be fearful or aggressive with people entering the stall. However, if you remove the
reinforcement (the feed) whenever the horse is kicking, the behaviour will gradually extinguish because it is no longer working. The longer the horse has been practicing the kicking the longer it will likely take to get rid of it, but if he only ever gets fed when he does not kick (and you may have to wait for him to tire of it the first few times or skip a few meals), then he will soon adopt a new tactic to “make the food come.”
Anyone who trains horses is using science and psychology whether they know it or not. If you approach a training issue considering only how to “make it work” for the horse,you can avoid wasting time on human concepts such as: “he’s just lazy; she doesn’t respect me; or my horse is ticked off about xyz” and just get out there and teach.
