Build A Better Bond With Your Horse

Improve your relationship with your horse by understanding how horses respond to human interaction.

- DR. KATHERINE ALBRO HOUPT, WITH JENNIFER VON GELDERN

Would you like to improve your relationship with your horse Understanding a bit about how horses respond to human interaction and different training methods can improve our relationships with them and strengthen the likelihood that they’ll perform behaviors that we’ve requested of them. It’s possible, too, that if we smile while we’re working with them, they’ll respond even more favorably.

If that sounds far-fetched, we’ll back it up with a study that indicates that horses can indeed recognize human facial expressions and that they prefer a smile to a scowl. First, though, we’ll look at negative reinforcement and positive reinforcement training methods, and how you can use both in formulating the best course for your horse’s training.

Negative Reinforcement

Negative reinforcement is a training method that can help teach a horse (or other type of animal or even a human) specific behaviors. It’s traditional and widespread in the horse world. With the use of the word “negative,” this method of training can conjure up misleading imagery of punishment or cruelty. In this case, “negative” simply refers to the removal, or negating, of something unpleasant or uncomfortable when a horse responds to a stimulus or cue the way we would like him to. With repetition, he learns that if he responds as we would like, the unpleasant condition will stop.