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Animals : an open access journal from MDPI2019; 9(9); 630; doi: 10.3390/ani9090630

Are Horses (Equus caballus) Sensitive to Human Emotional Cues?

Abstract: Emotions are important for social animals because animals' emotions function as beneficial cues to identify valuable resources such as food or to avoid danger by providing environmental information. Emotions also enable animals to predict individuals' behavior and determine how to behave in a specific context. Recently, several studies have reported that dogs are highly sensitive to not only conspecific but also human emotional cues. These studies suggest that domestication may have affected such sensitivity. However, there are still few studies that examine whether other domesticated animals, in addition to dogs, exhibit sensitivity to human emotional cues. In this study, we used a gaze-following task to investigate whether horses () are sensitive to human emotional cues (happy, neutral, disgust) and if they adjust their behavior accordingly. In the study, the experimenter suddenly turned her head to either right or left and showed emotional cues. The results revealed that horses significantly decreased the frequency with which they followed the experimenter's gaze and the total looking time during the gaze-emotional cue presentation in the Disgust condition compared to the Neutral condition. These results suggest the possibility that horses are sensitive to human emotional cues and behave on the basis of the meaning implied by negative human emotional cues.
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Publication Date: 2019-08-29 PubMed ID: 31470656PubMed Central: PMC6770165DOI: 10.3390/ani9090630Google Scholar: Lookup
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Summary

This research summary has been generated with artificial intelligence and may contain errors and omissions. Refer to the original study to confirm details provided. Submit correction.

The research article discusses a study exploring the sensitivity of horses to human emotions and whether these animals adjust their behavior relayed through these emotions. This study utilized a gaze-following task to gauge this sensitivity.

Research Objective

The objective of the research was to delve into the sensitivity of horses to human emotional cues. This focus was inspired by previous studies that indicated dogs’ high sensitivity to both their own species and human emotional cues. However, the study also aimed to investigate if this sensitivity results in a behavioral adjustment in horses.

Methodology

  • In this study, a gaze-following task was employed. This method essentially entails observing if an animal will follow the gaze of a human subject, in this case, an experimenter. This was used to investigate the sensitivity to the emotional cues.
  • The experimenter would suddenly move her head to either the right or left, showing varying emotional cues that included happiness, neutrality, or disgust.

Findings

The research found notable adjustments in the horses’ behavior depending on the emotional cues presented.

  • When the experimenter exhibited signs of disgust, the horses were less likely to follow her gaze. Furthermore, the duration of time that the horses spent looking during the ‘gaze-emotional cue’ presentation was significantly reduced compared to when the experimenter showed neutral emotions.
  • This significant decrease in frequency and total looking time suggests that horses are indeed sensitive to human emotional cues and re-adjust their behavior based on the implications of these cues, particularly negative ones.

Implications

These results imply that emotions don’t just play an important role in the social interactions of animals in their own environment, but they also extend to interactions between different species, in this case, humans and horses. This could lead to deeper explorations on the extent to which domestication has influenced an animal’s sensitivity to human emotions, informing better cross-species communication and interaction strategies.

Cite This Article

APA
Baba C, Kawai M, Takimoto-Inose A. (2019). Are Horses (Equus caballus) Sensitive to Human Emotional Cues? Animals (Basel), 9(9), 630. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani9090630

Publication

Animals : an open access journal from MDPI
ISSN: 2076-2615
NlmUniqueID: 101635614
Country: Switzerland
Language: English
Volume: 9
Issue: 9
PII: 630

Researcher Affiliations

Baba, Chihiro
  • Department of Behavioral Science, Graduate School of Humanities and Human Sciences, Hokkaido University, Sapporo 060-0810, Japan.
Kawai, Masahito
  • Shizunai Livestock Farm, Field Science Center for Northern Biosphere, Hokkaido University, Sapporo 060-0811, Japan.
Takimoto-Inose, Ayaka
  • Department of Behavioral Science, Graduate School of Humanities and Human Sciences, Hokkaido University, Sapporo 060-0810, Japan. atakimoto@let.hokudai.ac.jp.
  • Center for Experimental Research in Social Sciences, Hokkaido University, Sapporo 060-0808, Japan. atakimoto@let.hokudai.ac.jp.

Grant Funding

  • 15K20946 / Japan Society for the Promotion of Science
  • 18K18339 / Japan Society for the Promotion of Science
  • 26118004 / Japan Society for the Promotion of Science

Conflict of Interest Statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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Citations

This article has been cited 17 times.
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