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Merkies, K., McKechnie, M. J., & Zakrajsek, E. (2018). Behavioural and physiological responses of therapy horses to mentally traumatized humans. Applied Animal Behaviour Science, .
Abstract: The benefits to humans of equine-assisted therapy (EAT) have been well-researched, however few studies have analyzed the effects on the horse. Understanding how differing mental states of humans affect the behaviour and response of the horse can assist in providing optimal outcomes for both horse and human. Four humans clinically diagnosed and under care of a psychotherapist for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) were matched physically to four neurotypical control humans and individually subjected to each of 17 therapy horses loose in a round pen. A professional acting coach instructed the control humans in replicating the physical movements of their paired PTSD individual. Both horses and humans were equipped with a heart rate (HR) monitor recording HR every 5secs. Saliva samples were collected from each horse 30 min before and 30 min after each trial to analyze cortisol concentrations. Each trial consisted of 5 min of baseline observation of the horse alone in the round pen after which the human entered the round pen for 2 min, followed by an additional 5 min of the horse alone. Behavioural observations indicative of stress in the horse (gait, head height, ear orientation, body orientation, distance from the human, latency of approach to the human, vocalizations, and chewing) were retrospectively collected from video recordings of each trial and analyzed using a repeated measures GLIMMIX with Tukey's multiple comparisons for differences between treatments and time periods. Horses moved slower (p < 0.0001), carried their head lower (p < 0.0001), vocalized less (p < 0.0001), and chewed less (p < 0.0001) when any human was present with them in the round pen. Horse HR increased in the presence of the PTSD humans, even after the PTSD human left the pen (p < 0.0001). Since two of the PTSD/control human pairs were experienced with horses and two were not, a post-hoc analysis showed that horses approached quicker (p < 0.016) and stood closer (p < 0.0082) to humans who were experienced with horses. Horse HR was lower when with inexperienced humans (p < 0.0001) whereas inexperienced human HR was higher (p < 0.0001). Horse salivary cortisol did not differ between exposure to PTSD and control humans (p > 0.32). Overall, behavioural and physiological responses of horses to humans are more pronounced based on human experience with horses than whether the human is diagnosed with a mental disorder. This may be a reflection of a directness of movement associated with humans who are experienced with horses that makes the horse more attentive. It appears that horses respond more to physical cues from the human rather than emotional cues. This knowledge is important in tailoring therapy programs and justifying horse responses when interacting with a patient in a therapy setting.
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Whiten, A. (2000). Social complexity and social intelligence. In Novartis Foundation Symposium (Vol. 233, pp. 185–96; discussion pp. 196–201).
Abstract: When we talk of the 'nature of intelligence', or any other attribute, we may be referring to its essential structure, or to its place in nature, particularly the function it has evolved to serve. Here I examine both, from the perspective of the evolution of intelligence in primates. Over the last 20 years, the Social (or 'Machiavellian') Intelligence Hypothesis has gained empirical support. Its core claim is that the intelligence of primates is primarily an adaptation to the special complexities of primate social life. In addition to this hypothesis about the function of intellect, a secondary claim is that the very structure of intelligence has been moulded to be 'social' in character, an idea that presents a challenge to orthodox views of intelligence as a general-purpose capacity. I shall outline the principal components of social intelligence and the environment of social complexity it engages with. This raises the question of whether domain specificity is an appropriate characterization of social intelligence and its subcomponents, like theory of mind. As a counter-argument to such specificity I consider the hypothesis that great apes exhibit a cluster of advanced cognitive abilities that rest on a shared capacity for second-order mental representation.
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Klingel, H. (1968). Sozial Organisation und Verhaltensweisen von Hartmann- und Bergzebras (Equus zebra hartmannae und E. z. zebra). Z. Tierpsychol., 25, 76–88.
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Ben-Shahar, R. (1995). Habitat classification in relation to movements and densities of ungulates in a semi-arid savanna. Afr. J. Ecol., 33, 50–63.
Abstract: Habitat types were classified in a semi-arid nature reserve in South Africa in order to assess the spatial requirements of resident ungulates, namely zebra, wildebeest and impala. Multivariate analyses showed patterns of soil factors and plant species associations that corresponded with variations of local geological formations and the abundance of plants. The response of ungulates to habitats of different degrees of complexity in terms of soils and plant species associations was examined on the basis of annual occurrence. New habitat types were described through merging or subdividing the existing classification. New habitat categories which corresponded with high occurrences of ungulates provided better indications of the resource requirements for large herbivores. Wildebeest were restricted in their habitat requirements and were characterized by high seasonal densities in bottom lands, particularly during the late wet period. There was a considerable overlap in the preference of habitat types between wildebeest and zebra although zebra were aggregated during longer periods within the dolerite formation. Impala had a consistent annual preference for the granite formation where seepage lines and bottom lands were inhabited seasonally by large herd concentrations.
Résumé
On a classifié les types d'habitat dans une réserve naturelle semiaride d'Afrique du Sud, dans le but d'évaluer les exigences spatiales des ongulés qui y vivent, c'est à dire les zèbres, les gnous et les impalas. Des analyses multivariées ont révélé des schémas pour les facteurs du sol et pour les associations d'espèces végétales qui correspondent aux variations des formations géologiques locales et à l'abon-dance des plantes. On a examiné la réponse des ongulés à des habitats de complexité différente en termes de sols et d'associations d'espéces végétales, d'après leur présence annuelle. On a décrit de nouveaux types d'habitats en fusionnant ou en subdivisant la classification existante. Les nouvelles catégories d'habitats qui correspondaient à des présences abondantes d'ongulés ont fourni de meilleures indications sur les ressources exigées par les grands herbivores. Les gnous se limitaient aux endroits qui répondaient a leurs exigences et se caractérisaient par de hautes densités saisonnières dans les régions basses, spécialement pendant la dernière saison des pluies. Il y avait un recouvrement considérable des types d'habitats préferés par les gnous et les zébres, encore que les zébres se rassemblent plus longtemps dans la formation doléritique. Les impalas marquent une préférence annuelle constante pour la formation granitique où les sources et les terres basses sont occupées de façon saisonnière par des hardes très concentrées.
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King, S. R. B., & Gurnell, J. (2002). Behavioural ecology of Przewalski horses (Equus przewalskii) reintroduced to Hustai National Park, Mongolia. Ph.D. thesis, , .
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Gardner, P. (1937). The responses of horses in a discrimination problem. J Comp Psychol, 23, 305–333.
Abstract: 62 horses were trained to obtain food from the one of three boxes which was covered with a black cloth. The position of the box varied from trial to trial in a random order. Learning was apparently in terms of vision, rather than smell. Many errors were due to the line of direction of the horse's movement as it entered the experimental situation. For all animals the learning curve dropped rapidly during the first few trials. There was slightly more rapid learning in younger horses than in older ones. No sex differences were apparent. Percherons made fewer errors than Belgians. Draft horses showed a slight superiority over military and farm horses. The statistical reliability of these differences is not reported. Good retention was evidenced after a period of several months. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
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de Waal, F. B., & Tyack, P., (Eds.). (2003). Animal Social Complexity: Intelligence, Culture, and Individualized Societies. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
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Laland K.N. (2004). Social learning strategies. Learn. Behav., 32, 4–14.
Abstract: In most studies of social learning in animals, no attempt has been made to examine the nature of the strategy adopted by animals when they copy others. Researchers have expended considerable effort in exploring the psychological processes that underlie social learning and amassed extensive data banks recording purported social learning in the field, but the contexts under which animals copy others remain unexplored. Yet, theoretical models used to investigate the adaptive advantages of social learning lead to the conclusion that social learning cannot be indiscriminate and that individuals should adopt strategies that dictate the circumstances under which they copy others and from whom they learn. In this article, I discuss a number of possible strategies that are predicted by theoretical analyses, including copy when uncertain, copy the majority, and copy if better, and consider the empirical evidence in support of each, drawing from both the animal and human social learning literature. Reliance on social learning strategies may be organized hierarchically, their being employed by animals when unlearned and asocially learned strategies prove ineffective but before animals take recourse in innovation.
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Müller, A. E., & Thalmann, U. (2000). Origin and evolution of primate social organisation: a reconstruction. Biological Reviews, 75, 405–435.
Abstract: Abstract
The evolution and origin of primate social organisation has attracted the attention of many researchers, and a solitary pattern, believed to be present in most nocturnal prosimians, has been generally considered as the most primitive system. Nocturnal prosimians are in fact mostly seen alone during their nightly activities and therefore termed “solitary foragers”, but that does not mean that they are not social. Moreover, designating their social organisation as “solitary”, implies that their way of life is uniform in all species. It has, however, emerged over the last decades that all of them exhibit not only some kind of social network but also that those networks differ among species. There is a need to classify these social networks in the same manner as with group-living (gregarious) animals if we wish to link up the different forms of primate social organisation with ecological, morphological or phylogenetic variables. In this review, we establish a basic classification based on spatial relations and sociality in order to describe and cope properly with the social organisation patterns of the different species of nocturnal prosimians and other mammals that do not forage in cohesive groups. In attempting to trace the ancestral pattern of primate social organisation, the Malagasy mouse and dwarf lemurs and the Afro-Asian bushbabies and lorises are of special interest because they are thought to approach the ancestral conditions most closely. These species have generally been believed to exhibit a dispersed harem system as their pattern of social organisation (“dispersed” means that individuals forage solitarily but exhibit a social network). Therefore, the ancestral pattern of primate social organisation was inferred to be a dispersed harem. In fact, new field data on cheirogaleids combined with a review of patterns of social organisation in strepsirhines (lemurs, bushbabies and lorises) revealed that they exhibit either dispersed multi-male systems or dispersed monogamy rather than a dispersed harem system. Therefore, the concept of a dispersed harem system as the ancestral condition of primate social organisation can no longer be supported. In combination with data on social organisation patterns in “primitive” placentals and marsupials, and in monotremes, it is in fact most probable that promiscuity is the ancestral pattern for mammalian social organisation. Subsequently, a dispersed multi-male system derived from promiscuity should be regarded as the ancestral condition for primates. We further suggest that the gregarious patterns of social organisation in Aotus and Avahi, and the dispersed form in Tarsius evolved from the gregarious patterns of diurnal primates rather than from the dispersed nocturnal type. It is consequently proposed that, in addition to Aotus and Tarsius, Avahi is also secondarily nocturnal.
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Waran, N., Leadon, D., & Friend, T. (2002). The Effects of Transportation on the Welfare of Horses. In The Welfare of Horses (pp. 125–150).
Abstract: Typically, horses are transported many times in their lives, this is with the exception of the horses reared for meat. Although difficult to estimate the extent of the movement of horses worldwide, it is clear that this is a substantial and growing practice. Until recently research into the effects of the different methods of transport (road, sea and air), was limited. This may have been because it was presumed that, because of their financial and emotional value, horses experience higher standards of transportation, than other large domestic animals. The process of transporting horses includes a range of potential Stressors, and there is scientific evidence that many of these can impact upon the welfare of the horse. In this chapter, we examine the effects of the different modes used to transport horses and we offer suggestions where possible for improvements in this practice.
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