Horse sense: social status of horses (Equus caballus) affects their likelihood of copying other horses' behavior

Animal Cognition
Konstanze Krueger, Jürgen Heinze

Abstract

Animals that live in stable social groups need to gather information on their own relative position in the group's social hierarchy, by either directly threatening or by challenging others, or indirectly and in a less perilous manner , by observing interactions among others. Indirect inference of dominance relationships has previously been reported from primates, rats, birds, and fish. Here, we show that domestic horses, Equus caballus, are similarly capable of social cognition. Taking advantage of a specific "following behavior" that horses show towards humans in a riding arena, we investigated whether bystander horses adjust their response to an experimenter according to the observed interaction and their own dominance relationship with the horse whose reaction to the experimenter they had observed before. Horses copied the "following behavior" towards an experimenter after watching a dominant horse following but did not follow after observing a subordinate horse or a horse from another social group doing so. The "following behavior," which horses show towards an experimenter, therefore appears to be affected by the demonstrator's behavior and social status relative to the observer.

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Citations

Jul 19, 2008·Animal Cognition·Leanne ProopsBritta Osthaus
Jan 17, 2009·Animal Cognition·Evelyn B Hanggi, Jerry F Ingersoll
Jun 18, 2009·Animal Cognition·Sherril M Stone
Sep 17, 2010·Animal Cognition·Konstanze KruegerKatalin Maros
Dec 7, 2010·Animal Cognition·Konstanze Krueger, Birgit Flauger
Dec 15, 2012·Animal Cognition·Brian J GrecoNancy G Caine
Mar 29, 2014·Frontiers in Zoology·Elodie F BrieferAlan G McElligott
Dec 7, 2013·Animal Cognition·F PéronO Burman
Oct 31, 2013·Animal Cognition·Konstanze KruegerJürgen Heinze
May 31, 2014·Behavioural Processes·Manuel MengoliAlessandro Cozzi
Mar 4, 2008·Behavioural Processes·Konstanze Krüger, Birgit Flauger
Mar 29, 2016·Behavioural Processes·Lauren Brubaker, Monique A R Udell
Nov 14, 2013·Behavioural Processes·Konstanze KruegerCharlotte Hemelrijk
Feb 27, 2015·Animal Cognition·Maria Vilain RørvangJanne Winther Christensen
Jan 10, 2019·Animals : an Open Access Journal From MDPI·Hrefna Sigurjónsdóttir, Hans Haraldsson
Aug 1, 2009·Equine Veterinary Journal·J D AlbrightK A Houpt
Sep 19, 2019·Animal Cognition·Kira BernauerKonstanze Krueger
Nov 21, 2016·Animal Cognition·Aurelia SchuetzKonstanze Krueger
Jun 4, 2017·Animal Cognition·Fonti KarDaniel W A Noble
Sep 22, 2018·Frontiers in Veterinary Science·Maria V RørvangAndrew McLean
May 28, 2019·Animals : an Open Access Journal From MDPI·Laureen EschKonstanze Krüger
Mar 7, 2019·Frontiers in Veterinary Science·Christian NawrothEberhard von Borell
Jun 15, 2018·Animals : an Open Access Journal From MDPI·Joan-Bryce BurlaChristian Nawroth
Sep 28, 2021·PloS One·Konstanze KruegerRichard Byrne

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