Overview
The lecture explores how horses experience and express emotions, including their ability to interpret human emotions.
Exploring Horse Emotions
- Researchers aim to understand the emotional life of horses.
- Karen conducts experiments to trigger horse emotions, such as playing recorded horse sounds and showing photographs.
Experimental Findings
- Horses respond to recordings with behaviors like fear, curiosity, or startle.
- They also react differently to photos of horses and humans.
- Karen's team discovered horses have 17 facial expressions, more than chimpanzees (14) and dogs (16).
- These expressions are subtle and can be overlooked without careful observation.
Interpreting Behavior and Communication
- Horses show specific behaviors like sniffing the ground when feeling uncertain or uncomfortable.
- Such behaviors are compared to human gestures (e.g., scratching or glancing away) in uncertain situations.
- Horses focus on significant areas of the face, such as the mouth and eyes, when observing humans.
Emotional Awareness in Horses
- Horses seem to understand and interpret emotions in both other horses and humans.
- They can associate a person with the emotion that person displays, indicating high emotional awareness.
Key Terms & Definitions
- Facial expression — movement or positioning of facial muscles conveying emotion.
- Emotional awareness — the ability to recognize and interpret emotions in oneself and others.
Action Items / Next Steps
- Review the list of 17 horse facial expressions if available.
- Observe horse behavior for emotional cues during interactions.