The Science of Horse Training Demystified: Classical Conditioning

Mar 2
9 min read

When you hear a notification sound on your phone, you likely reach for it without thinking. Perhaps every day when 12 o’clock rolls around, your stomach starts growling. Or you get a whiff of coffee in the morning and instantly feel more awake before you even take a sip. These are all examples of classical conditioning, our next order of learning.

Classical Conditioning: a learning process that occurs when two stimuli are repeatedly paired: a response that is at first elicited by an unconditioned stimulus is eventually elicited by the conditioned stimulus alone

Associative Learning: a learning process in which a new response becomes associated with a particular stimulus

Latent Inhibition: a phenomenon where a prior, nonreinforced exposure to a neutral stimulus makes it harder to later classically condition that stimulus

Positive reinforcement: a practice that rewards desired behaviors to increase the likelihood of recurrence

One-trial Learning: when an organism forms a lasting association between a stimulus and a response after only a single exposure

Counterconditioning: a behavioral technique that uses classical conditioning to replace an unwanted response to a stimulus with a favorable one

But First, What is Associative Learning?

Before we can delve into classical conditioning, we must first understand what associative learning is. Associative learning is a process where an organism forms an association, or link, between a stimulus, behavior, environment, or event. This allows them to predict outcomes and adjust their behavior accordingly so they can better navigate their environment. It all comes down to survival. If the berries you ate yesterday made you feel sick, you will avoid them today.

The key to associative learning is cause and effect. One behavior, stimulus, environment, etc., must reliably precede a predictable outcome. This contrasts with habituation and sensitization, where the stimulus was inconsequential or meaningless.

Classical Conditioning

Horses that start banging on the stall door when the grain room opens, or pin their ears when the saddle is brought out, are displaying classical conditioning in action.

Classical conditioning is a form of associative learning where a stimulus comes to elicit, or bring about, a subconscious reaction. By definition, classical conditioning is when an involuntary response to an unconditioned stimulus becomes associated with a previously neutral stimulus.

That’s a lot to take in, so let’s start with some definitions:

Involuntary Response: a reflexive reaction that happens automatically, without conscious effort or control

Unconditioned Stimulus: something that naturally triggers an involuntary response without prior learning

Neutral Stimulus: a stimulus that has no meaning and, therefore, causes no response

Conditioned Stimulus: a previously neutral stimulus that, after being repeatedly paired with an unconditioned stimulus, triggers a conditioned response

An Example: Pavlov’s Dogs

If you have ever taken a psychology class or Googled “classical conditioning,” likely you have heard of Ivan Pavlov and his dogs. Pavlov is credited with the discovery of classical conditioning (hence why it is sometimes referred to as Pavlovian Conditioning).

His experiment was simple. His dogs, who were being kept for research purposes, were fed predictably every day. As part of his experiment, he tracked how much the dogs salivated and noticed that when food was brought to the dogs, they began to salivate more.

Chalkboard diagram of Pavlov's dogs explaining classical conditioning with food, bell, and dogs showing salivation response.

The food, in this case, is the Unconditioned Stimulus. It elicits salivation (our Involuntary Response) naturally, even without prior training. Pavlov wondered if he could harness the excitement of meal time to get the dogs to produce more saliva on command.

Pavlov began ringing a bell (a Neutral Stimulus) just before delivering food. After repeatedly pairing the bell with food, the dogs began to salivate whenever the bell rang, regardless of whether food was present or not. The bell (now a Conditioned Stimulus) elicited salivation without the need for food.

So, the horse that bangs on the stall door does it because they have been conditioned to associate someone going into the grain room with dinner following shortly after. The horse that gets grumpy at saddling time perhaps has come to associate a poorly fitting saddle with pain or their tack with exercise.

What is Required For Classical Conditioning to Occur?

Classical Conditioning can occur anytime a stimulus is consistently paired with one that elicits an involuntary response or strong emotional trigger. However, certain criteria can strengthen the classically conditioned association. These include:

Predictability

For a strong association, the neutral stimulus must always precede the unconditioned stimulus. This makes the neutral stimulus a reliable predictor of the unconditioned stimulus, allowing the subject to build a robust association between the two.

Close-up of a hand pressing a black clicker with a brown horse in the snowy background. The setting is outdoors with blurred trees. — Clicker training relies on classical conditioning

Timing/ Contiguity

The temporal relationship between the neutral stimulus and the unconditioned stimulus plays a critical role in the association that develops. Conditioning is strongest when the two stimuli occur in close succession.

Salience

The more salient (or noticeable) the neutral stimulus is, the quicker and more robust the conditioning. Afterall, it is hard to learn what something means if we do not notice it.

Number of Pairings

How often the neutral and conditioned stimuli are paired will determine the strength of the association. In general, the more times the neutral stimulus and the unconditioned stimulus are paired, the stronger the association between them will be.

Limited Prior Exposure

If the organism has too much experience with the neutral stimulus before classical conditioning is attempted, latent inhibition can occur. A phenomenon that makes it more difficult for an association between a neutral stimulus and the unconditioned stimulus to occur.

One-Trial Learning

Occasionally, classical conditioning can occur after a single exposure to the neutral stimulus. One-trial learning can happen when a single event is powerful or biologically significant enough to form a classically conditioned association without the need for repeated pairings of the neutral stimulus and unconditioned stimulus. One-trial learning is most often seen in taste aversion (an organism will avoid a certain food after it makes them sick once) and intense phobias.

Person in red jacket leads a brown horse into a trailer. Another person watches nearby. Open stable setting, horse wearing maroon leg wraps. — A single traumatic event in a trailer can lead to a lasting phobia

When training horses, we want to avoid extreme emotional reactions and intensely fearful events, which may lead to one-trial learning. If an event is traumatic enough (for instance, a horse has a bad first trip in a trailer), it is possible for a classically conditioned association to be formed that will trigger fear the next time the horse is put in the same situation in the future.

Classical Conditioning in Horse Training

The brain is constantly using classical conditioning to learn about its environment. Even if you are not intentionally conditioning stimuli, your horse is forming associations all the time.

There may be instances of intentional classical conditioning in our training, such as the use of a clicker. However, many more of the associations our horse is creating will occur without our conscious involvement at all. Every time you work with your horse, they are forming associations between…

A woman in an orange beanie stands beside a brown horse on a snowy ground, with a forest backdrop at sunset. — Your horse is always forming new associations

Their environment
The equipment being used on them
Their rider and trainer
Your cues and aids
Their emotional state

Negative emotional states, such as fear or discomfort, create negative associations that can lead to undesirable behaviors. For instance, if you always give your horse a rigorous workout in the arena, they may associate the space with discomfort and stress, making them act up or balk next time you go to bring them into the ring. If you ride your horse in a saddle that pinches them, they may start biting or kicking when presented with the saddle. If a horse is whipped, they may react fearfully to the sight of the whip, the location where the whipping occurred, and the person who hit them.

While negative associations can hinder our training by causing our horses to become tense, stressed, and fearful, positive associations can make our horses more responsive, willing, and confident in their work. Take, for instance, a horse that is trained with positive reinforcement. The positive emotional state brought about by correct R+ training will transfer to the horse’s environment, equipment, and handler, as well. That’s why some horses wait anxiously at the gate when they see their handler approaching. They have a positive association with their trainer that makes them excited to see them and happy to be around them.

Creating Positive Associations

Once you understand how your horse forms these connections, it is easy to ensure they are positive ones. Simply put, negative emotional states and experiences will create negative associations, while positive emotional states and experiences will create positive associations. Therefore, we want to ensure our training and handling are done while our horse is happy, relaxed, and having a good time.

We can help our horse create positive associations by…

Training using positive reinforcement

Positive reinforcement is all about creating positive associations and, when done right, is the best way to create a horse that is motivated, willing, and joyful in their work. Because horses trained with R+ are rewarded for working with us, they come to associate training with positive experiences, making them more likely to do what we want again in the future.

Person with a horse touching a yellow ball on a stick, standing outside a yellow building. Sunny day, relaxed atmosphere. — Positive reinforcement creates positive emotions that transfer to other stimuli

But not only that, because the horse is happy and has the pleasure centers in their brain firing, everything else will become associated with those pleasant emotions, including the environment, tools, and equipment, and even you! So if you want a horse that enjoys being around you, train with positive reinforcement so you become associated with good things that make your horse happy.

Keeping our horses in a calm, relaxed state of mind while training

We want the signals that denote training (i.e., the arena, a target stick, and ourselves) to induce a focused and calm state of mind. We do not want our horses to become wound up and overexcited or tense and stressed when the time comes to train. Therefore, we want to repeatedly pair a tranquil state with training so our horse reflexively becomes relaxed when training.

Maintain a calm state of mind by balancing tasks that ask your horse to raise their energy with relaxed activities, such as teaching them to lower their head on command (which can aid in relaxation), and teaching a neutral default.

Avoiding stress and discomfort

Horses that are trained using escalating pressure, or are lunged and round-penned a lot, often associate work with these unpleasant experiences. These horses can be more difficult to work with and may display unwanted behaviors (such as biting, balking, or bucking) because they associate work with a negative experience and do not want to participate.

Horse rears in an indoor arena. Three people observe; one holds a rope attached to the horse. The scene feels tense and focused. — To create positive associations, stress and fear should be avoided when training

Horses trained with positive reinforcement can also experience negative emotions if proper techniques are not followed. In fact, using food to train horses can easily create frustration if it is not super clear to the horse what is earning them food, or if food rewards are used sparingly and the horse feels like reinforcers are being withheld. In this case, training creates a negative emotional state and can create tension, stress, and lead to unwanted behaviors around food.

Counterconditioning

Horses are inherently spooky and fearful by design. Vigilance is how they managed to survive on the open prairies for thousands of years. However, today, where horses live primarily in a human-centric environment, their nature can become a nuisance and a safety hazard. If your horse is overly afraid of certain stimuli, objects, or environments, classical conditioning can help them overcome their fear in a process called counterconditioning.

A brown horse with a bridle stands on dirt with a red pole and white flag in front. Photo credit on the bottom right. — Counterconditioning can help a horse overcome their fear of certain objects

Counterconditioning is a technique that uses classical conditioning to change the emotional response tied to fear-inducing stimuli. Remember, classical conditioning works by creating a connection that allows a neutral stimulus to elicit an involuntary response. So by repeatedly pairing something that triggers fear with something positive, we can make the thing that once created fear induce positive emotions instead.

For instance, some horses that have been whipped repeatedly develop a fear of the whip and will react to even the sight of the object. To countercondition the sight of the whip, we would start by presenting the whip far enough away that it does not trigger a large reaction, and then give our horse a treat. Slowly, as our horse builds confidence, we can bring the whip closer and continue to deliver food each time the whip is presented. After many exposures, the horse will come to associate the whip with food, rather than pain, and will stop reacting fearfully.

Applications of Classical Conditioning in Positive Reinforcement Horse Training

Imagine being able to tell your horse exactly what you want them to do. With classical conditioning, it's possible. By creating an association between a specific sound (usually a clicker) and food, we can elicit the same positive emotions triggered by being given a treat when our horse does what we want.

Person training a horse to lift its front leg using an orange tool. Set in a sunny outdoor arena with a yellow stable in the background. — A clicker allows you to communicate exactly what you want with your horse

It works like this: if we are looking for our horse to walk forward a couple of steps and touch a cone with his nose, we will click the clicker the second his muzzle makes contact with the cone and then hand him a treat. When the horse touches the cone and hears the clicker, his brain releases a flood of positive emotions, thus making him more likely to touch it again in the future. Positive reinforcement and the marker signal transform training into a fun puzzle your horse is excited to figure out. We’ll take an in-depth look into positive reinforcement in the next section, Operant Conditioning, so for now, let’s look at how classical conditioning is used to train a marker signal.

Loading the Marker/ Clicker

Before we can use the marker signal to start communicating with our horses, we need to teach our horses what it means. This process is called loading the marker, and it uses classical conditioning to pair food with a particular sound.

Chalkboard illustration of classical conditioning with a clicker, treat, and horse.

To load the clicker, all you have to do is repeatedly pair the sound with food delivery. Then, just like Pavlov’s dogs, your horse will begin to anticipate food whenever they hear the sound. Start by putting your horse in their stall and working over a stall guard or outside behind a fenceline. Click (or give whatever sound you choose) and immediately hand your horse a treat or throw it in a feed pan. Repeat for about 5 - 10 minutes, then give your horse a break. Repeat sessions a couple of times a day over several days, and once your horse noticeably perks up or turns to their feed pan when you make the sound, they have formed a classically conditioned association, and you can start using it in training.

Remember, the mental state your horse is in will also be classically conditioned, so make sure your horse is in a calm, relaxed frame of mind so they do not begin to associate the clicker with getting excited. Even after your clicker has been loaded, always continue to give food after every click to keep the association strong.

Classical conditioning impacts everything we do with our horses, whether we are conscious of it or not. That is why it is important to understand its role in our horse’s training and how we can harness its power for communication so that it doesn’t end up working against us.

So far, we have learned about unconscious processes (habituation, sensitization, and classical conditioning) that change our horse’s behavior on a subconscious level. Next, we will learn how consequences can affect the conscious choices our horses make in a process called operant conditioning.