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Horse Personality Types

My instructor explained 4 basic personality types of horses.  I view personality tests with a bit of skepticism, whether they are applied to people or animals.  Nobody fits exactly into the assigned boxes.
However, sometimes the boxes help you understand at least a little bit of why your horse may be acting the way he is.  With that in mind, here is information about horse personalities from Pat Parelli's website (http://www.parelli.com/horsenality.html).

Horse can be classified as "left-brained" or "right-brained."
     Left-brained horses tend to be: dominant, brave, confident, calm, and tolerant.
     Right-brained horses tend to be: submissive, fearful, not confident, nervous, and reactive.

Horses can also be classifed as introvert or extrovert.
     Introverted horses tend to be: low energy, have more "whoa" (i.e., a lack of forward momentum), have a tendency to be slow, and have a tendency to stop often.
     Extroverted horses tend to: have high energy, have more "go" (i.e., lots of forward momentum), be quick, and run often.

So the Parelli website puts these 2 sets of qualities together into 4 basic horsey personality types:

 




Picture

This horse is a playful character that needs interesting things to do. He is obsessed with learning and needs variety and new things to keep it fun.
Welcome to the land of ā€œWhy should I? What’s in it for me?ā€ This horse reads people like a book. He knows what you want and he’s not going to give it to you, unless you treat him right. Even though he appears stubborn or lazy, he’s not at all lazy in the mind! He may move slowly, but he's always thinking quickly
This shy, timid, shrinking violet avoids pressure by retreating into himself. Success involves going very slowly at first and waiting for him to come out of his shell, to trust more. Pretty soon he’ll be offering you more.
This horse constantly needs reassurance. He gets confused easily and then gets afraid, so he needs you to make things simple, which will help him relax.


What do you think about them?  Have you ever played with a horse that fit pretty well into one of these personality types?

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