Enhanced Understanding of Horse-Human Interactions to Optimize Welfare.
Authors: Merkies Katrina, Franzin Olivia
Journal: Animals : an open access journal from MDPI
Summary
# Editorial Summary: Enhanced Understanding of Horse-Human Interactions to Optimize Welfare Merkies and Franzin's 2021 literature review synthesises research on how horses perceive and respond to human interactions, recognising that optimising equine welfare requires deeper understanding of the horse's sensory world and psychological capacities. The authors examined evidence across multiple domains: horses' ability to read human cues through body odour, posture, facial expression and attention; their capacity to retain memories of previous human interactions; and the relationship between equine cognition, personality traits and emotional states. Key findings demonstrate that horses are sophisticated perceivers capable of distinguishing between different human emotional and physiological states, though a significant evidence gap remains regarding whether horses genuinely empathise with human emotion or simply respond to detectable cues. The review emphasises that understanding the horse's *umwelt*—its subjective perceptual world—is foundational to developing welfare-centred handling and training approaches that account for how horses actually experience human contact rather than projecting human interpretations onto equine behaviour. For practitioners across disciplines, this underscores the importance of consistent, emotionally regulated handling; awareness that horses remember previous experiences with specific individuals; and recognition that our own physiological state communicates information to horses independent of our conscious intent.
Read the full abstract on PubMed
Practical Takeaways
- •Be aware that horses detect and respond to your emotional state, body language, and odour—maintain calm, consistent behaviour during handling and work
- •Horses remember past interactions with humans; establish positive experiences early to build trust and compliance
- •Consider the horse's sensory perception and cognition when designing training and management protocols to improve welfare outcomes
Key Findings
- •Horses can read humans through body odours, posture, facial expressions, and attentiveness
- •Horses are capable of remembering previous experiences when working with humans
- •Horses can recognize emotional states in humans, but evidence for empathy remains unclear
- •Enhanced understanding of human-horse interactions can optimize equine welfare