Recent research has revealed negative attitudes towards
mares.
For a long time, stallions have often been considered difficult
or dangerous, but now it seems that mares are being tarred with the same brush.
A study into riders’ perceptions of horse temperament and suitability for
ridden work, based on horse sex, found that mares are also seen as "bossy"
or "unreliable".
The research, published in the journal PLoS ONE, has found
horse riders are applying human gender stereotypes to horses - a form of
anthropomorphism - which could lead them to overlook the merits of mares and
fillies.
Lead author Kate Fenner, a PhD student in the Sydney School
of Veterinary Science, expressed concern that this gender bias against mares
could also jeopardise their welfare.
“When riders
assume their horses are being ‘bossy’, ‘difficult’, ‘flighty’ or ‘unwilling’
they may be more likely to punish or correct them as a result,” she said.
“A mare disobeying a rider’s signal could be interpreted
as the horse having a ‘bad attitude’ and be met with punishment,” she continued.
“However, when a gelding, thought to be reliable and easy-going, disobeys the
same signal, the rider may be more likely to conclude that the horse had not
understood the signal and work to establish the signal-response pattern with
the horse using reinforcement.”
The research shows that both mares and stallions are
considered bossy or difficult, but most leisure riders don’t ride stallions
because of an existing belief that they may be dangerous.
The study surveyed 1233 people, 94
percent of whom were women, and 75 percent were horse riders with at least
eight years’ experience. The predominance of women in the study is
representative of the riding population in Australia, said senior author
Professor Paul McGreevy of the Sydney School of Veterinary Science.
The questionnaire asked respondents to allocate three
hypothetical horses (a mare, gelding and stallion) to four riders: a woman,
man, girl and boy. Riders were described as equally capable of riding each
horse and each horse was described as suitable for all riders.
Participants were significantly more likely to allocate the
stallion to the man and nearly 50% of respondents did not allocate a horse to
the boy, even though they ranked rider gender as the least important factor in
their choice.
They were also asked which horses (mares, geldings or
stallions) were most suitable for the three equestrian disciplines of
show-jumping, dressage and trail-riding. They overwhelmingly chose geldings for
trail-riding, with mares being least preferred for both dressage and
show-jumping.
When given the choice of a mare,
gelding, or stallion to ride, more than 70 percent of respondents chose the
gelding; despite being told all the horses in the scenario were competent for a
specific task.
Professor McGreevy believes the gender stereotyping is based
on folk-lore and could ultimately be a self-fulfilling prophecy.
“If you’ve grown up believing that mares are moody or
fiery or difficult, you will tend to approach them accordingly and ride them
differently, then the horses themselves will respond differently,” Professor
McGreevy said. “This kind of prejudice against females is a bit like the
traditional bias against horses with chestnut (ginger) hair. Many riders
believe a chestnut mare is inherently stroppy or more fiery, and there is no
evidence for this.”
Professor McGreevy said the prejudice underlined the need
for the upcoming global survey of horse behaviour from the University of
Sydney, due to be launched soon.
For more details, see the Open Access article:
It's all about the sex, or is it? Humans, horses and temperament.
Fenner K, Caspar G, Hyde M, Henshall C, Dhand N, Probyn-Rapsey F, et
al. (2019)
PLoS ONE 14(5): e0216699.
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