I have been conflicted for a long time about whether to write about this topic or not because I know it will raise the hackles of many. Nevertheless, my wife has convinced me it is an important enough topic to risk it. I brace myself, ready for the pushback.
Back in early 2012 Stephen Peters and Martin Black co-wrote a book called Evidence-Based Horsemanship. Its purpose was to give a neuroendocrine explanation of how horse training methods work.
Let me say from the outset this essay is not about the validity of the claims in the book. The book's claim of “evidence” for equine behaviour and training is a topic for another time. Instead, I want to discuss the growing use of the term “scientific evidence” by several horse trainers.
I should also add that I am well qualified to discuss this topic. I have a PhD in physiology and for many years I was a medical researcher studying the role of the neuroendocrine axis of the fetus in determining the timing of birth. Furthermore, I have been a professional horse trainer for 28 years.
Since Peters and Black came out with their book, several trainers have taken an interest in shaping the rhetoric of their business around the terms “science’ and “scientific evidence” as a validation of their training. But in reality the use of terms like “scientific evidence” adds nothing to the training.
A couple of days ago I watched a video by a trainer working with a head shy horse. While working with the horse he talked about dopamine and the RAS and the parasympathetic system. He was using this jargon to an audience who are unlikely to have the training to know the difference between a catecholamine and a protein or a neurotransmitter and a radio transmitter.
And what amazing method was he using that the science told him would work? Flooding. He used flooding pressure on the head shy horse with his hands until it stopped fighting. This is a method that has been used for thousands of years, on billions of horses by millions of horse trainers - long before neurophysiology was a thing.
Did the trainer measure dopamine or cortisol secretion to know when the horse was relaxing and to stop flooding the horse with pressure? Did he record the electrical activity of the brain to know when the horse was making a change? No.
He did what you and I and all horse people do when working a horse. He watched for changes in body language to tell him when the horse was getting better or when it needed a break or when he needed to do more.
In another example, a trainer discussed the balance of the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems to explain why getting a horse’s focus makes training better. This is extrapolation from studies of laboratory animals, yet the trainer discusses the subject as if it is proven in horses. This offends me as a scientist. But even more, I question why discuss this to an audience that knows nothing about the nervous systems and it makes them no more informed about training their horses. People already know focus is important and is something we are always trying improve. But discussion of the nervous systems to horse owners does not improve the life of any horse or make any person a better trainer. It’s meaningless. They are not presenting a paper at a conference to fellow physiologists.
These are just a couple of examples of many that can be found on the net.
Every training method exists simply because it works for some horses, and some trainers, at some time. Therefore, it can be assumed that any method that gets a good change in a horse works through the same physiological mechanism. If that’s true, knowing how they work through the equine brain does not help you understand which methods are best or why you would choose one method over another, or which horses are better suited to one method over another. People are no further ahead by knowing which neurotransmitters are triggered and which are not. Horses are not better helped by an owner knowing if the sympathetic or parasympathetic nervous systems are dominant at any time.
If a person wants to explore the physiology behind horse behaviour, that’s great. Go for it. I am a great believer in knowledge for knowledge sake. Knowledge is never a waste. However, I am a little bothered by the growing prevalence of the “scientifically proved” stamp appearing on videos and web sites when the evidence is questionable AND when it adds nothing to improving the way people work with their horses. Furthermore, most horse owners do not have the training to question and explore the scientific claims of these trainers. It’s like me being told by my mechanic that the butmen sensor needs replacing in my car. Okay??? I don’t know if that’s true or not or what it is, but he is the expert so I agree.
I worry a day will come when the test of the quality of a trainer will be if they use methods that are based on some physiological idea of how a horse’s brain function. If you think that is far-fetched, notice that since natural horsemanship became a thing you never see trainers promoting themselves as using “traditional” or “old-school” methods. If they do use old-time methods they are called “classical” because “classical” sounds much better.
The bottom line is that I believe using the “science” tag is nothing more than a marketing strategy. As a person trained in the rigorous sciences, it bothers me to see something as beautiful as good science exploited in this way. Despite the nice idea of using methods backed by scientific data, in reality, nothing changes for the horse or the trainer or the owner. Good trainers will still be good and bad trainers will still be bad irrespective of the science behind their methods.
Alexander the Great was considered a great horseman, but a lousy scientist.