The horse remembers and adjusts the behavior according to his expression

Horses are more alert when meeting people they have seen angry faces in before.

The University of Sussex team and the University of Portsmouth found that horses were able to recognize their faces and expressions , UPI reported on April 26. They will rely on this information to determine if the person is a threat.

Horses observe the face to assess danger.(Photo: University of Portsmouth / University of Sussex).

In the experiment, the scientists gave horses a picture of a happy or angry expression. After that, they were led to meet the person in the picture, this time with a normal expression. They observe the movements of the horse's eyes and notice, they consider those in the image with angry faces to be a bigger threat.

Previous research indicates that horses tend to focus on negative or dangerous objects with the left eye because the right brain hemisphere will assess danger. In the new experiment, the team saw horses following the subject photographed with angry expressions with their left eye.

"We found that horses not only read people's expressions but also their previous emotional state to regulate their behavior when they met them," said Karen McComb, a professor at the University of Sussex. Scientists already know that horses can recognize expressions. However, the new finding shows that they also recall the expression associated with a person's face.

"We know that horses have social intelligence, but this is the first time mammals have been shown to have this ability. It is noteworthy that this happens only by looking at a person's photo for a short time. With a certain expression, they have no particularly positive or negative experience for this person, ' shared Leanne Proops at Portsmouth University.