Horses Failed to Learn from Humans by Observation.

Animals (Basel). 2020 Jan 29;10(2).
Horses Failed to Learn from Humans by Observation.
Rørvang MV1, Nielsen TB2, Christensen JW2.

Author information:
1. Department Biosystems and Technology, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, 23053 Alnarp, Sweden.
2. Department Animal Science, Aarhus University, 8830 Tjele, Denmark.
Abstract

Animals can acquire new behavior through both individual and social learning. Several studies have investigated horses’ ability to utilize inter-species (human demonstrator) social learning with conflicting results. In this study, we repeat a previous study, which found that horses had the ability to learn from observing humans performing an instrumental task, but we include a control for stimulus enhancement. One human demonstrator and thirty horses were included, and the horses were randomly assigned to one of three treatments: (A) full human demonstration, (B) partial human demonstration, and (C) no human demonstration. The task was for the horses to touch an object situated 1 m away from a feed box, to open this feed box, and thereby obtain a food reward. The success of each horse, the behavior directed towards the apparatus and the human, and behaviors indicative of frustration were observed. The results showed that horses observing a full and partial human demonstration were not more successful in solving the instrumental task than horses not observing any demonstration. Horses that did not solve the task expressed more box- and human-oriented behavior compared to successful horses, which may be an indication of motivation to solve the task and/or frustration from being unable to solve the task.