When horses apply pressure to each other they are generally focused on directing movement and not on changing emotions. When a horse uses pressure to chase another horse away from the hay they are not concerned about the ill feelings it might create in the other horse.
Stockholm Syndrome
Friend or Foe?
Trust and Obedience Discussed Further
The thing that separates good horse people from second-rate ones, is this idea that the best horse people are always working on expanding the ‘contract of trust’, whether it is a first-time experience or the horse has done it a thousand times. The second-rate horse people are just satisfied with obedience and are okay with a horse working to simply avoid trouble.
When Has A Horse Learned A Lesson?
A Little Bit of Stick and a Little Bit of Carrot
All training works by inducing emotional discomfort in a horse to search for a new response and then reducing that anxiety when the horse gets it right. When the training is done well, the level of emotional discomfort doesn’t exceed the threshold amount required to evoke a change of thought and a search. Every training method depends on this and none are more gentle or cruel than the other if this principle is applied.