Horse Owners’ Knowledge of Fundamental Care and their Perceptions on the Implementation of a Mandatory Certificate of Knowledge.

This research investigated horse owners’ understanding of basic equine care, their views on the need for a mandatory certificate of knowledge for owning a horse, and whether having such a certificate influences their knowledge. The study revealed that there is a deficit in general equine-care knowledge, especially in understanding the animal’s behavior. Still, no significant difference in knowledge was noted between certificate holders and non-holders.

Research Methodology

• The study involved an online survey of 23 questions: 18 closed-ended and 5 open-ended.
• The survey was distributed globally through snowball sampling, gathering responses from 1847 horse owners aged 18 and above from 17 different countries.
• 96% of the surveys, the equivalent of 1781 responses, were completed and usable for the study.

Findings

• Approximately 52% of the participants stated they held a current equine knowledge certification.
• Around 59% of the respondents believed a mandatory certificate of knowledge should be necessary for buying, selling, or owning a horse.
• Horse owners who already had an equine knowledge certificate were more likely to support a mandatory certificate.
• On average, knowledge questions were correctly answered 68% of the time, indicating that roughly one out of three horse owners lacked basic knowledge in equine care.
• The knowledge area where horse owners performed the worst was in behavioral interactions, particularly in aspects of pain recognition and learning theory terminology.
• This lack of understanding could increase the risk of horse owners applying misinformed or inappropriate techniques to manage horse behavior and training, thus potentially compromising the horse’s quality of life.

Certification and Knowledge

• Despite the apparent deficit in knowledge, no meaningful difference was noted between the total correct scores of horse owners with a certificate and those without one.
• However, for more complex questions, horse owners holding a certificate scored better than those without.
• The researchers acknowledged that more work is needed in designing an evidence-based assessment framework if mandatory certification for horse owners is to become a valuable tool for improving horse welfare and quality of life.