Abstract: We carried out a questionnaire survey of the caretakers, using 86 riding horses kept in the Equestrian Park, Tokyo (Japan Racing Association). The questionnaire survey used a 5-point scale and a 3-point scale to assess several caretakers' impressions of each horse's temperament, on the basis of the norm and the horse's tendencies in ordinary care and daily training. Factor analysis of the temperament scores obtained with the 5-point scale questionnaire revealed three mutually independent factors that we named “anxiety”, “novelty seeking” and “understanding”. In order to verify the reliability of this questionnaire survey, a balloon reactivity test was conducted using the same horses. Each horse was introduced into an unfamiliar indoor arena (7 mx12.5 mx3 m) in the center of which two balloons slowly revolved. The horses' responses were assessed by recording changes in their behavior and heart rate (HR) during the 5 min experimental period. By comparing the questionnaire survey and the balloon reactivity test, it was found that the horses evaluated as highly anxious by the caretakers tended to show greater HR increases and defecate more often during exposure to the balloon stimuli than did the other horses. Additionally, the horses assessed by caretakers to have problems with ordinary care and/or training showed greater increases of HR and frequency of defecation in the balloon reactivity test, and the horses assessed as having `a long adaptation time to unfamiliar objects' were found to be unwilling to touch the balloons. Thus, the horses' behavior during the balloon reactivity test was highly consistent with their temperament as determined by the questionnaire. These results suggest that the questionnaire survey would be an effective means to assess equine temperamental traits, especially those related to anxiety.

Abstract: 1. A leg band containing a transponder was fitted to 80 birds in a perchery containing 1,000 birds. 2. The transponder emitted a unique identification number when a bird walked on one of 8 flat antennae on the floor. The recording apparatus was used to measure the amount of time that each of the tagged birds spent on the slatted and littered areas in a 6-week period. 3. Some birds spent long periods of time on the slats, possibly as a means of avoiding repeated attacks. Duration on the slats was greatest in birds with the worst (as opposed to better) feather scores of the head, back and tail regions. 4. Birds that spent long periods on the slats were lighter than other birds at both 39 weeks of age and 72 weeks of age and had greater back, head and tail feather damage, consistent with these birds being victims of pecking. 5. Tagged birds received a social avoidance test outside the perchery at 39 weeks of age, which suggested that birds retreated to the slats in response to pecks rather than just to close proximity to other birds. 6. The failure to find that duration on the slats was related to anatomical indicators of stress (liver, spleen and bursa of Fabricius) suggests that retreating to the slats following pecking attenuates physiological stress responses. 7. We conclude that the provision of areas where birds in a large group can avoid pecking may improve the welfare of a minority of victimised birds.

Abstract: This paper describes how man can enter the social hierarchy of the horse by mimicking the behaviour and stance it uses to establish dominance. A herd is organised according to a dominance hierarchy established by means of ritualised conflict. Dominance relationships are formed through these confrontations: one horse gains the dominant role and others identify themselves as subordinates. This study was conducted using five females of the Haflinger breed, totally unaccustomed to human contact, from a free-range breeding farm. The study methods were based on the three elements fundamental to the equilibrium of the herd: flight, herd instinct and hierarchy. The trainer-horse relationship was established in three phases: retreat, approach and association. At the end of the training sessions, all of the horses were able to respond correctly to the trainer. These observations suggest that it is possible to manage unhandled horses without coercion by mimicking their behaviour patterns.

Abstract: We investigated the behavioural and cognitive development of a captive male infant chimpanzee, Ayumu, raised by his mother, Ai. Here we report Ayumu's achievements up to the age of 2 years and 3 months, in the context of complex computer-controlled tasks. From soon after birth, Ayumu had been present during an experiment performed by his mother. The task consisted of two phases, a matching-to-sample task in which she received token rewards, and the insertion of these tokens into a vending machine to obtain food rewards. Ayumu himself received no reward or encouragement from humans for any of the actions he exhibited during the experiment. At the age of 9 months and 3 weeks, Ayumu performed his first matching-to-sample trial. At around 1 year and 3 months, he began to perform them consistently. Also during this period, he frequently stole food rewards from his mother. At 2 years and 3 months, Ayumu succeeded for the first time in inserting a token into the vending machine. Once he had succeeded in using a token, he performed both phases of the task in sequence 20 times consecutively. The infant's behaviour was not shaped by food rewards but by a strong motivation to copy his mother's behaviour. Our observations of Ayumu thus mirror the learning processes shown by wild chimpanzees.

Abstract: Abstraction is a central idea in many areas of physical comparative cognition such as categorization, numerical competence or problem solving. This idea, however, has rarely been applied to comparative social cognition. In this paper, I propose that the notion of abstraction can be applied to the social arena and become an important tool to investigate the social cognition and behaviour processes in animals. To make this point, I present recent evidence showing that chimpanzees know about what others can see and about what others intend. These data do not fit either low-level mechanisms based on stimulus-response associations or high-level explanations based on metarepresentational mechanisms such as false belief attribution. Instead, I argue that social abstraction, in particular the development of concepts such as seeing in others, is key to explaining the behaviour of our closest relative in a variety of situations.