06/04/2025
Pressure in the form of a good massage or the weight bearing that builds strong bones, is not the same as the pressure in "pressure and release” horse training, aka Negative Reinforcement (R-) training.
The "pressure" in negative reinforcement horse training is called an aversive stimulus. It’s something unpleasant that is applied and then removed dependent on a certain behaviour being performed by the horse, in order to influence future behaviour.
What also happens is that someone else calls the shots about when that pressure is applied and removed. I’m sure it can often seem illogical and confusing to the horse.
If we have a massage, we can ask for less pressure, if our weights at the gym are too heavy, we can reduce the weight. Horses don’t get that type of control.
No one can avoid pressure altogether, either physical pressing or an aversive stimulus such as in Negative Reinforcement. It’s all around us, in our environment and we respond to it in various ways. We get hot, we get cold, we get tired, we get hungry, our backpack straps are pressing too hard into our shoulder, which are all aversive states that we experience and we can control their removal.
Unlike horses, someone else isn't controlling whether we take our jumper off or put it on, or when we rest or when we eat or whether we can remove our backpacks. Yet, that's what happens to horses all the time.
To say that you do your horse a disservice and worse, you can cause them harm, by not teaching them about pressure and Negative Reinforcement, is not accurate.
Negative Reinforcement is an observation of behaviour, of how organisms including horses, interact with their environment. It’s an observation because it’s already happened, it’s happening all the time and organisms who want to survive, know how to avoid pressure, unpleasant and painful things; aversive stimuli. They learn it or they die, we don’t need to teach it to them over and over and over. Because that’s what pressure and release horse training is, it’s millions of little micro aggressions, millions of little moments of pressure, of aversive stimuli that is used to shape behaviour.
Then, every cue is either a re-experiencing of this aversive stimulus or alternatively, is the threat of the aversive stimulus, if the horse doesn’t comply.
Yes there can be nuance to it, there can be subtle cues once the behaviour is learnt, there can be the opportunity to avoid the aversive before it is applied. If the trainer is good, not many are unfortunately.
But it’s still using discomfort to teach and that's unnecessary. Telling people you are doing your horse harm by not teaching them how to respond to pressure is a fallacy perpetuated by pressure based trainers. Of course we all know how to respond to discomfort, but you have to accept that pressure IS discomfort in the first place.
I’m not saying it’s bad or evil, but I’d like people to understand it more fully and how to do it better and more effectively, whilst avoiding the fairy tales. If R- trainers want to weigh in on R+ training and dismiss it as “treat training”, then I’d expect them to be fluent in all the ways we learn, including the one *they’re* using and promoting above others.
