Do you see what I see? Investigating the validity of an equine personality questionnaire

Subjective equine personality questionnaires have the potential to predict a range of industry-relevant outcomes including fear reactivity, compliance with human cues, pain expression and susceptibility stereotypies, in time- cost-efficient manner. However, produce meaningful measures target animals’ behavioural tendencies, subjective assessment tools must satisfy four criteria: internal consistency, predictive validity, inter-rater reliability, test-retest reliability. The Equine Personality Test (EPT) has been developed assess horses on five factors based trait ratings from familiar observer. While EPT shown it not assessed for reliability or To this end, three experienced primary caregivers riding instructors 25 using EPT. subscales were investigated Cronbach’s α intra-class correlation (ICC) analyses. Agreeableness, Neuroticism, Extroversion Gregariousness towards People had high Cronbach ICC coefficients (α > 0.7; ICC>0.8). By contrast, Horses subscale low = 0.39) coefficient (ICC=0.498), an adequate (ICC=0.784). Primary higher than most questionnaire items. therefore provides internally consistent highly reliable Extroversion, equines, although should be interpreted caution. scores can further improved by targeting as raters. Taken together previous findings demonstrating validity questionnaire, these results contribute making only checked against all criteria valid tool. This positions relevant tool that may used tendencies industry research settings alike.