Why Should Human-Animal Interactions Be Included in Research of Working Equids’ Welfare?
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
I enjoyed reading your article and felt you presented your thoughts on the role of human animal interaction on working equid welfare very thoroughly, although I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from the abstract. Fortunately, the article was so well written as to explain the concepts alluded to in the abstract very completely. The article has a good flow of the topics and takes logical steps to prove the points. I do not have any suggestions for the major content of the article since I felt you covered and supported the topic adequately. However, I struggled with some very minor grammar and sentence structure details. To help you with this, I converted the pdf of the manuscript to Word document and put my edits right into the text. Hopefully, you can see what my suggestions are in the attached document. Mostly it is minor adjustments to comma placements, use of prepositions and minor grammatical errors. I am recommending the article be published with these minor corrections.
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Author Response
We have revised the manuscript “Why should human-animal interactions be included in research of working equids welfare?” according to the reviewers’ comments. We appreciate the time and effort that the three reviewers took in order to improve the quality of the review, at the same time we were very happy to read such positive comments on the work done. Overall, we have included all grammatical suggestions. Sometimes, due to elimination of one sentence, as requested by one of the three reviewers, this sentence could no longer be modified as suggested by a second reviewer. We have done all modifications with the track changes function as suggested.
Some other changes include:
Line 108-110. We have added a sentence in order to complete information about the One Welfare concept.
Line 125-128: We have included a specific example of the implications that positive human-animal interactions can have on animals’ productivity.
Line 334 and Line 368. We have included a comment on interventions for adults in order to improve empathic skills. Most literature related with increasing empathic skills in adults and young adults have focused in people with autism and Asperger, making it difficult to find literature to cite. But this should be something to further study and implement when working with communities in order to obtain data.
Line 462. We have included example of instrumental perception in order to clarify the term
Reviewer 2 Report
This is a much needed review of HAI including that of human-horse interactions. The review was relatively well organised but a clearer outline of content could have been made more explicitly a the beginning of the introduction. Some of the text was a little repetitive in places but this can be easily addressed.
An extensive range of contemporary references were sourced and used effectively.
I have made comments to assist - mostly with improving the english and structure within sections. I hope that these (n=110) are helpful with the next iteration of this review paper. (File attached).
No statistics needed to be included.
File attached.
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Author Response
We have revised the manuscript “Why should human-animal interactions be included in research of working equids welfare?” according to the reviewers’ comments. We appreciate the time and effort that the three reviewers took in order to improve the quality of the review, at the same time we were very happy to read such positive comments on the work done. Overall, we have included all grammatical suggestions. Sometimes, due to elimination of one sentence, as requested by one of the three reviewers, this sentence could no longer be modified as suggested by a second reviewer. We have done all modifications with the track changes function as suggested.
Some other changes include:
Line 108-110. We have added a sentence in order to complete information about the One Welfare concept.
Line 125-128: We have included a specific example of the implications that positive human-animal interactions can have on animals’ productivity.
Line 334 and Line 368. We have included a comment on interventions for adults in order to improve empathic skills. Most literature related with increasing empathic skills in adults and young adults have focused in people with autism and Asperger, making it difficult to find literature to cite. But this should be something to further study and implement when working with communities in order to obtain data.
Line 462. We have included example of instrumental perception in order to clarify the term
Reviewer 3 Report
This is not a research based paper, but instead a review of the relationship between equid welfare and the owners’ empathy for the animals. Most of my comments are minor language ones.
The author might add a paragraph on how to increase empathy in the adult owners; the only data they report is in school children. Perhaps the equid charities should have the owners listen to a lecture on animal pain etc. in exchange for treatment of their animals. How can we change their “locus of control”?
Locus of control is a new term to this reviewer. It is defined on page 8 but might be defined earlier
Define instrumental perception
27 result essential - do you mean are essential
Packed work dose that mean carrying loads? Use as pack animals might be clearer
58 as are their equines
63 for successful performance
78 improving
85 are you contrasting the livestock industry with the horse and donkey industry
105 has HAI been defined previously in the ms.
127 fear of
133 “given lights’ should be ‘have shed light on ‘
138 used for recreational purposes
141 omit of Despite these
186 don’t capitalize oxytocin
195 empathize
207 to empathy
220 the associated with
221 on a human –animal
222dairy cattle
232 Thy decreased
233 another similar
236 implications for
238 relate to
279 ability not sensibility
“Therefore, the increased sensibility of owners to identify painful conditions in their animals, moreover, to being related to empathy, can be an important factor determining the welfare status of animals, and thus may affect the way in which equines are treated and cared for.” re-write this confusing sentence
290 can be expressed as
302 omit although
302 in human-equine
307 With respect
318 of inducing
324 capable of experiencing
327 because of the dual roles
330 owners’ perception of
334 despite the fact that that the
337 found that most
360 in a personalized…. of the welfare
369 incorporated
385 attitudes which stockmen hold
403 in agreement with Lund
407 omit one
574 do not capitalize within title of article.
Author Response
We have revised the manuscript “Why should human-animal interactions be included in research of working equids welfare?” according to the reviewers’ comments. We appreciate the time and effort that the three reviewers took in order to improve the quality of the review, at the same time we were very happy to read such positive comments on the work done. Overall, we have included all grammatical suggestions. Sometimes, due to elimination of one sentence, as requested by one of the three reviewers, this sentence could no longer be modified as suggested by a second reviewer. We have done all modifications with the track changes function as suggested.
Some other changes include:
Line 108-110. We have added a sentence in order to complete information about the One Welfare concept.
Line 125-128: We have included a specific example of the implications that positive human-animal interactions can have on animals’ productivity.
Line 334 and Line 368. We have included a comment on interventions for adults in order to improve empathic skills. Most literature related with increasing empathic skills in adults and young adults have focused in people with autism and Asperger, making it difficult to find literature to cite. But this should be something to further study and implement when working with communities in order to obtain data.
Line 462. We have included example of instrumental perception in order to clarify the term
