By Estelle LEVAL
Key words: Autism, Neurotypical, Horse assisted therapy, Communication, Children, Therapy
This article is about the horse assisted therapy (HAT) for individuals with autism spectrum disorder. To treat this notion, I will resume the part one of the book Autisme et Equithérapie of Courtial (2018). The part is entitled The HAT practised with EquiThé’A association. It is divided into three chapters: advances on autism, what parents of children with autism must know before using HAT, and horses.
In this book and in this article, we will use the term “autism individuals” to speak about autism spectrum disorder individuals, and “neurotypical individuals” to speak about individuals without autism.
- The advances on autism
The first theory who tried to explain autism was the psychoanalysis approach, which affirmed that autism was caused by a bad relationship with the mother. This theory was less and less approved by community and especially by parents who felt accused. With the questioning of psychoanalysis, others therapy was developed, like behavioural therapy, which is based on compartmental conditioning and gratification.
In the contemporary approaches a new idea emerged: the main difference between autisms and neurotypicals individuals is related to the theory of mind. This is the capacity to represent in our mind the point of view, the thoughts and emotions of others. Autism individuals would be deficient at theory of mind; they would be unable to represent the intersubjectivity. Autism individuals would work in images and objective relations between objects. The principal point of difficulties is the language. Autism individuals don’t access to the subjectivity of language, the metaphors, the irony, etc. In a nutshell, they don’t access to the pragmatics of language.
However, the idea of theory of mind deficit is contested by most autism individual who have high level of intellect. Indeed, the study way of autism is mostly directed by neurotypicals individuals. Probably that the notion of theory of mind hasn’t any sense for autism individuals. For Chen (2018, quoted by Courtial, 2018) the theory of mind is a relationship mode in which everyone tries to influence each other. By contrast, the autisms relationship mode tried to communicate objective information without influence. Autism is a different form of operation, but is not an incapacity.
2. What parents of children with autism must know before use HAT
The horse creates a relationship between the autisms and another human, it is a mediator. The HAT is based on the principle of circulation of energy between different living beings. This exchange of energy forms the therapeutic nature of the sessions of HAT. We speak of a cycle to evoke relations, without intentions and without language. Notably because these two notions pose problems to the autism individuals in their relations with the others. Once the link, simply behavioural, could be created with the horse, the language can be added, with humans, without risk of non-interpretation of the child.
At EquiThé’A they welcome people with autism but also families. It is a care that can be global and family. There are no goals or intentions in HAT sessions with autisms. Each person evolves at his own pace, finds benefits or not, according to his singularity. The horse is not only a mediator. The autism individuals learn with him, in order to build a relationship with a living being. Testimony of a therapist: “At EquiThé’A, the horse is the stimulus and we accompany this stimulation”. The goal is certainly not to make autistic “normal” or like neurotypical.
Garcin (2015, quoted by Courtial, 2018) says that horses understand humans, they capture intentions, feelings, emotions, personality, etc. They enter into relationship and can lead to modify behaviours of humans. It is a sociable animal, which requires a lot of respect and gives a lot in return.
3. The horses
The horse survives thanks to its gregarious instinct and its hypervigilance that allows it to flee quickly in the face of danger. Humans have always domesticated horses for leisure, war, etc.
The horse has an anxiolytic effect, for several reasons: it is an animal that lives only in the present moment, it has no goals to achieve or is parasitized by external emotions; because of its animal nature it creates distance with anxiogenic human relationships; and he is physically accessible, sweet and welcoming. An attachment is often created in the therapeutic relationship between the patient and the horse.
The idea in the therapeutic work is to be able, through the relation with the horse, to work the relation with oneself and the others. The relationship with the horse is created in the context of the household and the presence of the therapist. It is the whole context that allows for wellness and change.
Communication with the horse is nonverbal, bodily and emotional. The horse is the mirror of the emotions of the humans he meets. It is impressive to observe the parallel between behaviours of horse and patient If the contact between horse and patient get the horse abnormally irritated, we can suppose that the patient next to him is stressed and irritated too. This is seen through their posture, contraction of muscles, and attitude.
The choice of the horse is essential at the beginning of the therapy. Sometimes, patients tend to choose horses that are similar to them in terms of personality or history (e.g. a man who had experienced abandonment in his life unknowingly chose a horse abandoned by his mother being foal). When patients are asked to describe the horse they have chosen, they quickly come to talk about themselves. They can talk freely in a more relaxed way because they are facing a benevolent, non-judgmental living being. Then, by association, they attribute these characteristics to the therapist who accompanies the sessions.
Five criteria in horses are to be taken into account for the HAT: the management of the emotions, their capacities to live in herd, their reactivity towards humans and their tactile sensitivity and their motor activity.
The rest of this book explores daily HAT and non-autistic HAT.
Bibliographical references:
J.-P., Courtial. 2018. Autisme et Equithérapie : L’apaisement retrouvé. Paris, France: Editions du Dauphin.