Since being domesticated about 5500 years ago, horses have lived with humans and have built close relationships not only as livestock but also as companion animals in sports and leisure.On the other hand, it is originally an animal that lives in a herd with friends, and recent research has revealed that it has high communication skills such as reading emotions from the facial expressions and voices of fellow horses.Therefore, in this study, we examined whether horses read emotions by associating human facial expressions with voices.

　The research method is as follows.First, a human "smile" or "angry face" is projected on the screen to show the horse, and then the voice that the person calls the horse's name with a "praise tone" or "scolding tone" is heard from the speaker on the back of the screen. Replayed.In this way, we investigated changes in the response of horses when human facial expressions and voice emotions match and when they do not.

　As a result, horses responded to voice about 1.6 to 2.0 times faster when human facial expressions and voice emotions did not match, regardless of whether they were close to themselves.As for people who are close to him, when his facial expression and voice emotions do not match, he continued to look at the person who heard the voice for about 1.4 times longer.In other words, it is considered that the horse had a sense of discomfort that the human facial expression and the emotion of the voice did not match, and the result strongly suggested that the human facial expression and the voice were associated with each other to read the emotion.

　By accumulating such research, it is expected to elucidate the mechanism that supports the formation of bonds between companion animals and humans, such as how horses have communicated with humans and formed bonds.

Paper information:[Scientific Reports] Cross-modal perception of human emotion in domestic horses (Equus caballus)