TYPES OF EQUINE LEARNING
When we try to teach a flighty beast manners or maneuvers, it helps to know how his brain learns. We can then adapt lessons to match the brain processes at work. In general, the basis of all learning is neural connection. Allow me to oversimplify: A group of neurons that represents water activates at the same time as a group of neurons that represents lever-pushing. They form a weak connection that strengthens with use. Soon the horse knows that pushing the lever on an automatic waterer makes water arrive. In brain science, we say, “Cells that fire together, wire together.” Eventually the connection gets so strong that learned behavior becomes automatic. Using neural connection as a physiological basis, horses pick up knowledge in six basic ways: Association, Consequence, Observation, Emotion, Problem-solving and Testing.
Humans use these types of learning, too, but we add to them the powers of cognition, planning, reasoning, forethought and judgment, along with doubt, bravado, arrogance, and fear of embarrassment. A whole lotta extra baggage, in other words. Horses are fast learners partly because they don’t carry that baggage. They’re pure learners, too. A horse’s behavior is a mirror of his past: It is not diluted with his parents’ expectations, boss’s demands or children’s needs. A primary joy of living with horses is that they never lie about who they are. Good trainers can work with a new horse for a week and know exactly how he has been handled ---including the indiscriminate carrots an owner offers in secret or the weekly groundwork she claims to practice.
Learning of any type can yield both positive and negative results. Horses and humans gain knowledge that accrues to our benefit, but with equal proficiency we gain knowledge that is detrimental. We have to be careful about what we teach a 1,200-pound horse, because he has such a great memory that we might not be able to unteach the lesson for a long time.
1. LEARNING BY ASSOCIATION
Learning by association occurs whenever we link two events or ideas by space or time. Thunder immediately precedes lightning; for that reason, our minds connect thunder and lightning. A hay truck precedes hay in time, so horses relate the truck to the hay. From simple association, we get to classical
Horses are experts at learning by observation, especially when watching herdmates who are superior to them in age or rank.
conditioning: By nature, dogs salivate just before receiving food. Pavlov rang a bell with the food, and the dogs learned to salivate to the bell alone. Praise to a horse in the form of a phrase like, “Good boy,” precedes a stroke on the neck, so the horse learns to link the words to the pleasant stroke.
2. LEARNING BY CONSEQUENCE
Learning by consequence takes classical conditioning a step further. Sometimes it’s called operant or instrumental conditioning, but don’t let the terms scare you away. Think back to Psych 101. Do you remember B. F. Skinner---the guy who experimented with rats and pigeons to explore the science of reinforcement? Reward a rat for pushing a lever when a specific noise occurs, and the rat learns to slap the lever whenever it hears the noise. Horses who happen to paw the ground when the hay truck arrives then get fed, learn to connect pawing with a reward---and there ya go: “Houston, we have a problem.” Horses who learn that stopping to rest is linked with the phrase, “Good boy,” will soon slam on the brakes whenever they hear that term---or a similar one like, “Goodbye!” ---and presto, another glitch is born.
3. LEARNING BY OBSERVATION
Observation is a powerful tool that could be used more often in horse training. Humans observe and follow suit every day---witness all the research showing that children imitate their parents and peers along with their favorite television and video game characters. Adults watch and copy, too, as if one person’s misbehavior gives the rest of us permission to act up. Likewise, we learn positive skills when we watch a friend negotiate a conflict successfully then try the technique for ourselves the next time we’re in hot water.
Household pets imitate---many people let their older dogs teach new puppies to come, stay, jump into a car, and walk down the stairs. Working dogs teach youngsters how to herd sheep, forage for food on sled trips and work cattle. Likewise, wild animals learn by observation. In Australia, a wild dolphin was hospitalized in a training center where she watched her counterparts practice unnatural behaviors for exhibition. Upon the wild dolphin’s return to home, she taught
Greet a horse you haven’t seen in 10 years, and he will remember you.
her pals how to walk on their tails.
Horses are experts at learning by observation, especially when watching herdmates who are superior to them in age or rank. Foals who watch their dams being groomed and shod are much easier to groom and shoe later in life. Stroke a mare, and her foal will soon come to you asking for similar treatment. Foals who watch their mothers accept frightening objects become more calm themselves around those objects. Young or old, horses can learn to open gates and stall doors by watching their peers. Horses copy social behavior by watching their friends approach and follow humans, and they learn to load into a trailer more easily after they watch other horses saunter in without a fuss. If you have the Loader from Hell, let him watch a dominant horse from his own group hop on, get praised, petted, rewarded with a yummy treat and get back off. Make the observations comfortable, with no strings attached. (Don’t show him loading problems ---remember, horses learn whether the ultimate result is bad or good.) Observations of polite loading will allow your horse to accept future trailer lessons with greater attention and composure
When horses live in indoor/outdoor stalls or paddocks, I sometimes teach them to urinate outside by rewarding that behavior. Their stalls stay fresher this way, and with long-term shaping
5. LEARNING BY PROBLEM-SOLVING
Southwestern Colorado is home to an 80-square-mile national park that preserves ancient Pueblo ruins. It also accommodates almost 100 abandoned horses who roam free and seek their own food, water, and shelter. Normally, the land offers just enough water and greenery to keep the horses alive. But drought conditions in 2014 caused them to ramp up their problem-solving skills. The horses, called “trespass livestock” by frustrated park rangers, learned that there’s little need to trek through steep, rocky canyons in hot weather searching for muddy droplets of water. After all, the park’s bathrooms and restaurants have water!
So that’s where they go. And that’s exactly what they did---hanging around near faucets and puddles outside snack areas and museums, waiting for a drink. Of course, the rangers seldom allowed visitors to turn on faucets, but that didn’t deter the horses. They learned to dig for water lines and break them open. They also figured out how to open ice machines near snack areas and help themselves to the contents.
How exactly? There are a lot of things going on here: With their excellent capacity for smell, the horses would have sniffed out the most plentiful sources of water. Natural instincts for easy travel would lead them to civilized areas---why skitter around over boulders when you can just saunter down a road? They would have been rewarded on rare occasions by humans who turned on a hose---and they would have watched people turn on the water. They would have seen visitors opening ice machines. That’s several forms of learning combined, as is common in real life. Hmm, a horse operating a water faucet? Sounds sketchy. But journalist Wendy Williams writes of her experience as a young owner whose horse had watched her fill water buckets at an outdoor spigot near her house. One winter morning, the water in the horse’s stall had frozen---a horseman’s nightmare. Watching from the kitchen, Williams saw her horse solve the problem. He jumped his pasture fence and jogged directly to the water spigot. He smacked the handle with his hoof a few times to turn it on, formed his big, horsey lips into a cup, and took a long drink. Satisfied, he then moseyed on back to the barn.
6. LEARNING BY TESTING
Don’t be surprised at the beginning of a ride when a trail horse grabs for grass, an arena mount cuts corners or a field hunter hesitates to trot. These horses are testing, and experienced riders answer with swift and clear corrections. Novices don’t even realize they are being tested, so the horse ups the ante. Soon, our trail stinker is grazing belly deep in clover while the rookie tugs uselessly on the reins, and the eventing jughead remains behind the leg at a four-beat canter while approaching a big log jump. Most people interpret testing as misbehavior.
But brain science tells another story. Testing is one of the most effective
In Australia, a wild dolphin was hospitalized in a training center where she watched her counterparts practice unnatural behaviors for exhibition. Upon the wild dolphin’s return to home, she taught her pals how to walk on their tails.
means of learning in all mammals. To improve human memory, we test ourselves as we study, answering our own questions by retrieving a given piece of information repeatedly. We then lengthen the interval between retrievals until we can go for a week or a year without forgetting the answer.
This process isn’t limited to academic study; it works with procedural memory as well. Every time we post the trot, we are retrieving information about how to coordinate our bodies for that movement. A certain subset of neurons activates every time we pull knowledge from our brains. This neural subset can represent anything from a simple yes/no answer to a complex sequence of sophisticated behaviors. And whenever it activates, the connection among those neurons becomes stronger. Soon it is strong enough to last.
When we have a neural network that is triggered reliably by a test of some sort, we say we have “learned” that response. Horses never stop testing because they never stop learning. Pay more attention to your horse’s testing behavior. Reward him when he accomplishes a desired behavior or fails to perform a common misbehavior. Remind him of your expectations when he asks whether he can get away with a naughty trick. And be grateful that your horse tests you---it’s his way of figuring out what you want.
Adapted by permission from Horse Brain, Human Brain: The Neuroscience of Horsemanship, published in 2020 by Trafalgar Square Books. Available from HorseandRiderbooks.com;
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Given the capacity of horses to learn by observation, we don’t step back often enough to say, “Just let him watch, and let’s see if it helps.” Chances are it will.