Horse Power

Dr. Beth Lanning grew up around horses and planned to spend her life caring for them as a veterinarian. Decades later, the Baylor public health professor is still working with horses — including one made of metal and motors.  

Baylor has become a leading research hub for equine-assisted services — a field focused on utilizing horses for human benefit — commonly for therapeutic benefit. People have touted the healing power of horseback riding since ancient Greece, where Hippocrates is often credited with praising riding’s “healing rhythm.” But today, modern interventions, such as Baylor’s MiraColt, which mimics the movement of a horse, no longer require the animal’s physical presence. 

Lanning, now associate chair of Baylor’s Department of Public Health, studies human-animal interventions (especially those with horses) for children with autism, veterans with PTSD, and individuals recovering from trauma.  

In 2014, Lanning’s own research published in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders looked at children with autism who were enrolled in a nine-week equine-assisted activities program. Parents reported significant improvements in their children’s physical, emotional, and social functioning after six weeks, with greater gains than among children enrolled in a non-equine program.  

Anecdotally, while working with autistic children, Lanning said she found that the coinciding qualities between the children and the horse helped build a connection between them. For instance, the high anxiety, reactivity, and hypersensitivity to sensory cues within both parties may create a mutual experience of trust and understanding of the other. For a child with autism, a connection with a horse can act as a powerful conduit because this big animal is very similar to them, Lanning said. 

For veterans, Lanning said, working with horses can upend what they learned in the military, learning leadership built on trust rather than orders. A 2023 review in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health proposed that handling a horse may help build veterans’ sense of control, autonomy, and assertiveness. 

In combat, veterans are taught the need for order and protection, creating a complicated transition back into society. Lanning said they try to figure out their purpose, as well as their place in civilization.  

“They’re a very high social order,” she said of members of the military. “But then, when they don’t have that as a protection, it’s not as emotionally safe for them or physically safe.”  

She emphasized that having a connection with a horse that is built on the foundation of trust instead of demand can put them in a leadership role that is comfortable.  

A hallmark of Baylor’s research on veterans, post-traumatic stress disorder, and equine-assisted services came to fruition in 2017. A study authored by Lanning and partially funded by the Horses and Humans Research Foundation found that veterans who engaged in an eight-week horseback riding program reported they felt less anxious and depressed and had an overall greater quality of life versus those who did not participate.  

There are many proposed theories as to why equine-assisted services help trauma survivors. Horses, highly attuned to humans’ body language and emotional state, respond to this and act as a mirror for participants to recognize and regulate their own emotional state.  

“A horse is a prey animal so they are going to react to everyday life differently,” Lanning said. “They are very in tune to your emotions that you’re not showing. They read body language very well.” 

According to Lanning, building a relationship with an animal may serve as practice for rebuilding trust with other people, and takes away the judgemental factor that some face after trauma. At times when people have gone through life-changing situations and protection feels stripped, to gain control of an animal this large could give them that mental strength back. 

Lanning said that with this therapy, individuals start to take a little bit more control and feel empowered to readapt to everyday life.  

“To be able to have some kind of relationship with that size of an animal is empowering for a lot of people,” Dr. Lanning said. 

Though studies are mounting, researchers still can’t say exactly why horses help. In a 2025 proof-of-concept study, Lanning and Dr. Cory Smith used portable brain imaging technology on veterans as they groomed and led horses, a very early step toward understanding what happens in the brain during horse-human interactions.  

For some patients, though, the benefit may come from something simpler: the way a horse moves. In hippotherapy, licensed physical, occupational, and speech therapists use the horse’s gait as a tool for treatment.  

The movement of the horse’s walk engages the rider’s balance, posture, and coordination in a three-dimensional pattern similar to human walking. It’s an effective tool for treating people with autism, providing unique sensory, motor, and neurological input.  

With this idea, Lanning and Dr. Brian Garner, associate professor of mechanical engineering, designed and invented a device — the MiraColt — that replicates the motion of horseback riding. The device reproduces a horse’s motion in real time, working the same muscles as would be used on a living animal.   

“You’re up higher, your center of gravity is higher,” Lanning said. “All of that really helps in improving the mobility and also the brain connection back to the muscles.” She said the movement of the horse improves the balance and movement of the person. 

In 2009, Garner’s students built the first prototype of a machine that would replicate a horse’s movement. After four generations of refinement and a patent, that machine became the MiraColt.  

The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board in 2020 granted an interdisciplinary team of scientists and engineers, including Lanning and Garner, some $600,000 to study the device’s effectiveness. The study found that: 

• Regular sessions on the MiraColt led to measurable physical improvements (like smoother walking patterns and better walking speed),  

• The device showed no statistical difference in engagement versus riding a live horse,   

• The device successfully challenges the brain and muscles to stay upright,  

• And the unique rhythmic sensory input from riding the device helped lower reactivity, resulting in children feeling calmer and more in control following sessions.  

Although the evidence is promising, the research behind equine-assisted services is nowhere near finished. The phenomenon of hippotherapy has reached an international audience as studies are taking place all over the world. Currently, Lanning said she plans to travel to Prague and get information on international equine services. She said she’s also interested in learning more about the use of equine-assisted services for people with dementia and Alzheimer’s disease.  

For now, the connection between humans and horses remains a powerful reminder that sometimes, healing can come from an unexpected place.