Having identified that horses exhibit several personality domains across contexts and that variance in equine personality is dependent on breed and type of work, this section aims at reviewing literature conducted in the past on personality of horses. Through the literature review, this study will determine whether equine personality differs between categories of age, sex, colour, height and price and how horse owners describe their horses during online advertisements.
This exploratory mixed methods study proposes to examine equine personality traits via language used in online horse advertisements. In doing so, personality trait differences between categories of: age, sex, height, colour and price will be examined and compared with existing horse personality scales to determine how existing trait-based equine personality scales relate to how horse owners describe their horses.