Harmonious communication and physical coordination between horse and humans relies on mutual trust and cooperation. | Photo: Thinkstock

Q: What does it mean to earn a horse’s “trust,” and is trust the same for horses as it is for humans?

—Via e-mail

A: Trust is essential to forming and maintaining social attachments, and when people are in trusting relationships, they are healthier, happier, and more productive.1 Cooperative horse-human partnerships also seem to be based on trust, and various games have been promoted for building trust in horses.2 Recent research in equine-assisted mental health has explored how people develop trust by working with horses,3 but is trust the same for horses as it is for humans, and how does one go about gaining a horse’s