Horses. Good concise article imo.

Ref. this article, Mandal;

In the references, one person is listed as "D.Goodwin", and credited with papers published in the fields of ethology and animal behaviour. I don't know if this is the same person as the Dr Deborah Goodwin who wrote an article entitled 'Lost in Translation' in the August, 2008 issue of ‘Horse & Rider’ - but, if so, I would be very dubious about giving any of her work credibility.

I wrote to the editor of 'H & R' after reading 'Lost in Translation', describing it as follows:-

"I don’t believe I have ever read such an appallingly written article about horses – and I have been studying horses, in both theory and practise, and reading extensively about them, for over 50 years. We all have our own fixed ideas, and prejudices, particularly about subjects on which we feel strongly. But, in a nominally scientific article written for an equine magazine, I expect to find facts objectively reported and analysed, with supporting evidence and references, not the sweeping statements and dismissive comments more typical of a tabloid newspaper."

My critique of Dr Goodwin's article ran to ten pages, in which I highlighted a catalogue of failings, which would never have been accepted for a moment in a doctoral thesis - as Dr Goodwin herself must be aware.

I didn't realise until the editor wrote back that Kelly had also taken them to task about the article in question, and had been invited to write a responding article, in conjunction with Dr Victoria Fowler. (Dr Fowler holds a distinction at MSc in Equine behaviour, has taken Kelly's horse psychology workshop, and is the IH horse psychology project supervisor). This article was published by 'H & R' in November, 2008.

When asked by the editor of 'H & R' if I had any objection to them forwarding a copy of my letter to Dr Goodwin, I said I would consider it only courteous to do so, and would be interested to read her response. Dr Goodwin, as far as I know, never responded to either Kelly and Victoria's article, nor to my letter.

Mandal, is it possible for you to check at your original source of this article if the D. Goodwin referenced is Dr Deborah Goodwin? I did try an address on the .pdf file, which was;

www.animalsentience.com

but that took me to a site headed 'Compassion in World Farming', and I couldn't get any further than that.

With best regards,

Drumduan

I've just read the article and it seems fine (well-supported by references, most of which I have) except for a few points. The author refers to 'pair-bonds' but that is not really an appropriate term to use with horses, because in ethological terms it refers to exclusive bonds between a mated pair, usually in birds. 'Pair-bond' seems to have entered the equine vocabulary via the back door (not sure from where) and is now rather sloppily used even by people like Paul McGreevy to refer to close social bonds between 2 horses. Why not use 'social bonds' instead? Anyway, that's just nit-picking. But I also thought the author was a bit sloppy in some of the things she said about operant conditioning; for example, she says that 'Positive and negative
reinforcers can both be viewed as rewards in that they both lead to an increase in the performance of the desired response.' That is not a scientifically acceptable definition; scientists who study learning theory tend not to use the word 'reward' anyway, because it is a subjective term and they are looking only at the response itself. But if we look at it subjectively, would you really regard the cessation of something aversive - however mild - as a 'reward'? I think things would have to be pretty bad for that to be the case. In any case, experiments have shown (I'll try to find the references if anyone wants to know more) that animals (including humans) are far more motivated to perform actions which result in something pleasant for them than they are if their actions simply result in avoidance of something.

Enough of that; other than those points, I really couldn't find much to quibble at in the article, which seemed well-researched and well-thought out.

I would be interested, though, to know what the same author (if it was the same, which sounds likely) said in the article Lost in Translation to provoke a 10-page response! That sounds like the kind of response I would make to something that flipped my switches, so I'm intrigued! Anyone got a copy of the article?

Lesley

I do think most people nowadays realise that 'release' and 'reward' are two completely different things. In other words, the idea that release from pressure is a reward in itself is becoming old hat. I think most people are intelligent enough to see the difference.

The fact that the author of this article has apparently misunderstood release and reward as blacktent has argued is a sign that perhaps this thinking isn't as 'old hat' as you seem to think Ashleigh.
I suspect it comes from the desire to impress the importance of the release in learning... what do I know.

When I said 'old hat', I meant carp. I was just being polite! I am not sure that is a good excuse to misrepresent anyway.

I knew what you meant Ashleigh, I've read enough of your posts to feel pretty confident as to your meaning.

Perhaps you'd like to write to the author and see where she gets her thinking on release from?? I always find it odd that most in an article can be considered correct but there are one or two 'incorrect' things... who is right I have to wonder. This is why I try to remain open minded to most things.

I'm not being argumentative here just pointing out that even scientists can and do disagree.

I meant to pick up on the word 'wrong' in this quote. I don't see learning and reaching a different understanding or conclusion as meaning I was wrong before, like all thinking /learning we have it is constantly changing so I don't believe the words right and wrong are always appropriate. I think this is the aspect of some discussions gets to me the assumtion that some are just plain wrong because they don't see things the same way. I'm taking about theories here btw not facts.



Do you think the rest of the article is carp then? Just interested cos I've read articles where some parts make sense but some is to me rubbish or doesn't make sense.

This particular one as I said I agreed with what was said.