Complete or standardized temperament tests

It was therefore important to release subjective impressions and to provide the industry with a measurement tools resulting from the work of ethology research. As part of a collaboration between INRA and the National Stud, Léa Lansade conducted for over three years a longitudinal study to identify a model of temperament in the horse.

This model has five major dimensions :

•     Emotivity: tendency of the horse to react more or less strongly to sudden events (eg surprise) or new ones (eg to pass on an unknown surface)
•     Gregariousness: does it support to separated from other horses?
•     Motor activity: is it an animal that spontaneously moves or not at all?
•     Responsiveness to humans: does it easily come into contact with a man?
•     Sensory sensitivity: tendency to react more or less strongly to tactile stimulations.

These dimensions can be predicted from 8 months old and appear stable at least up to 3 years.

Tests are performed in a standardized way according to a very strict protocol.
They involve the use of different stimulations, auditives, visuals and tactiles. The equine is observed in a demountable structure covered, divided into three compartments and isolated from external disturbances.

All these tests allow to edit a "temperament profile" for the measured horse.
The score presented for a dimension is the average of different measures. 0 is the lowest score and 100 the highest.

For each dimension, the horse is positioned regarding to the median * obtained on a reference population. (* median: value that separates the reference population into two equal parts: 50% of the horses tested have a result lower than the median value, and 50% higher than this value.).
Different studies of several hundred horses and ponies have identified equines that best suits to a type of use.

The principal conclusion to these studies is there is no good or bad temperament.
It is all a matter of taste or equestrian discipline or level. But it seems some profiles are more suitable for leisure while others fit more to sport use.
Less emotive horses are rather more suitable for beginner riders and recreational riding due to a greater ease of use. On contrary, more emotive horses are more sought by experienced riders and for a sportive practice.
Recent studies shown that if well managed,  the most emotional horses tend to respond better to negative reinforcement learning (those used in horse riding), are often more respectful of the obstacle and often more efficient in CSO.

Horses measured

In France, tests, as described above, are use in particular to characterize stallions (example: French saddle pony stallions)
But to consider a selection of stallions based on this criteria, it requires to know the value of the heritabilities of these temperament measures, that is to say the part left by genes to the descendants (value 0 to 1). We do not know them now.
In japan, heritability of docility for veterinary examinations was estimated at 0.25 in English thoroughbreds.
In Germany, heritability of the horses’ character "pleasant under saddle" was estimated between 0.24 and 0.41.
New projects are emerging today in order to identify the ideal horse / pony temperament profile according to its use (leisure horse driving, competition horse driving, hiking, instruction, patrol in town ..) and establish the characteristics temperament of different French breeds.