How are horses helping to heal humans?

6 Minute English

BBC

Language Learning, Education

4.6 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 11 December 2025

⏱️ 7 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Horses and humans have had a close relationship for thousands of years, but did you know that horses, along with other animals, are being used to help with physical and mental illness? Neil and Georgie discuss this and teach you some new vocabulary.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	BBC Sounds, Music, radio, podcasts.
0:05.9	What's best? A morning shower or an evening shower?
0:09.9	What can magic teach us about the brain?
0:12.7	Making friends as you get older?
0:14.9	These are all topics you'll discover in the reading room,
0:18.5	our new series of magazine-style articles on our website.
0:22.0	They each come with highlighted vocabulary, comprehension questions and an audio download.
0:27.6	Learn about the world and improve your reading skills with the Reading Room at BBClearningEnglish.com.
0:35.4	Six-minute English from BBC LearningEnglish.com.
0:42.4	Hello, this is 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English. I'm Neil.
0:46.8	And I'm Georgie. Neil, have you ever ridden a horse?
0:50.6	Yes, I have. I can't say that I enjoyed it much. I was a bit scared, to be honest. How about you?
0:57.2	I used to ride horses a lot, actually. My favourite thing was to ride a horse through the countryside.
1:03.9	I love horses. They're so majestic and lovely. The relationship between humans and horses has been
1:09.8	close throughout history,
1:11.2	but recently this has gone beyond riding horses for fun or using them for work.
1:16.0	Equine-assisted services, sometimes called horse therapy,
1:19.5	is a health trend where caring and interacting with horses is used to heal physical and mental illness.
1:26.0	Here's Daciani Navanayaga, presenter of BBC World
1:29.3	Service Programme, The Conversation, to explain. Equine Assisted Services is now an umbrella term
1:35.2	which encompasses a whole range of treatments involving activities and interactions with horses
1:40.6	to promote better human well-being. Equine-assisted services is an umbrella term,
	...

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