Canine Nation

While debates rage on whether or not using positive training with your dog is a good idea or not, those of us who use it every day are enjoying what it brings to our lives.  Many of our dogs have developed very clever and creative ways to get our attention or to earn their rewards.  Some have even learned to outfox us and make us laugh.  And there is nothing wrong with a little playfulness and joy.  Dog training is not all about serious obedience and performance, after all!

Could it be that there is a Tyranny of Small Dogs?  Tyranny not because the dogs themselves are doing anything wrong.  Quite the opposite; small dogs seem to have a tremendous capacity to lull us humans into thinking that we don’t have to work with them like we would a larger breed.  Somehow we expect them to be “great little dogs” just because they are small and cute and we get to cuddle them.  And that could be working against them if we are not giving them the training and structure they need.

Our culture is full of images of courageous, loyal, smart, and lovable dogs.  Many of those dogs are just fictional ideals, the sort of perfect dog we all wish we could have.  Perhaps our idealism goes even further than that if we also attribute the best in human qualities to our dogs.  And that's where we need to be careful.  If we put too much expectation on our dogs, do we lose sight of their own qualities that make them so remarkable?  Perhaps we should love our dogs for who and what they are and not risk being disappointed if they do not live up to our unrealistic expectations.

I used to think that people should use whatever their dog is wild about as a reinforcer in training. I'm not so sure about that now.  It's easy to think that because it's motivating, it's the best reward ever. Sometimes, it can be TOO stimulating!  It can even be distracting.  And if that distraction takes away from learning, are we really doing the best thing for our dog?  There is such a thing as too much of a good thing.

Cues or Commands are the signals we give to our dogs when we want them to perform a behaviour for us.  How we teach them and how we use them will have a great influence on whether our dog understands and does what we ask.  Teaching a cue seems like a simple thing, but it's more complex than you might imagine.  Your dog wants to do it right, you just have to give him the right cue!

How can dogs be stupid and smart at the same time? How can they have less intelligence than humans and still control our households? For all our intelligence, we humans certainly find our reasons to claim to be both inferior and superior to our canine companions when it suits us.

Owning a dog is wonderful and rewarding but it is also a big responsibility. Training and management are not simple tasks as some would have us believe. But with the right teachers, it isn't all that difficult to learn to do it well. Could we be doing a better job of teaching people about training their dogs?

Ever stick your hand in your empty pocket as if you had a cookie in hopes your dog would run over to you? Have you ever taken a menacing step toward your dog in hopes they would sit more quickly? Both of these clever tricks really amount to lies you tell your dog. You don't have a cookie and you aren't going to hit them. But if they THINK those things are true, it could be to the owner's advantage. And taking advantage of our oh-so-honest dogs might not be the best idea. In the long run, it could lead to being ignored more, mistrust, or worse. Being honest with your dogs might be a better idea.

There is a lot of talk about "balance" in dog training these days. But balance might not be as easy as just mixing equal parts of rewards and punishment. A lesson from high school science class shows that equal numbers do not mean equal value. Sometimes balance means finding the right proportions of what your dog values. Balance means a healthy, happy dog and a good relationship with their owner.

Dogs are, in many ways, a reflection of their owner. They live with us and they learn from us. Sometimes they learn a little more than we would like about us. They can use what they learn to get what they want from us. If our dogs are always learning, are we always teaching? If we're not teaching, what are they learning? We all do our best and in the end, we all get the dog we deserve.

Getting results can be about "good", "good enough", or "GREAT!" It matters how we train. Ask Olympic athletes Usain Bolt and Oscar Pistorius. How you teach your dog can make all the difference in the world.

You know that horrible moment when you are at the park with your dog friends and you call your dog and they ignore you? Yeah, me too. It's a mystery why dogs sometimes choose not to do what we ask. Sometimes there are very good reasons why they don't respond. But other times, well, it's just a mystery.

Many think that Behavioural Science treats organisms like machines, manipulating behaviour and bending others to their will. But it's not simple. In fact, there is another side to Operant and Classical Conditioning. What you can learn about your dog while you are changing his behaviour might just surprise and delight you. You might just discover that the science can show you your dog's personality in wonderful detail!

The roots of reinforcement training based on behavioural science were in science labs at universities. But animal trainers quickly saw the value in positive training techniques and began adopting them as early as the 1960's. Today animals from fish to horses to birds to lizards are being trained with behavioural science. Perhaps most importantly to listeners of this podcast, even dogs are trained that way. Very successfully I might add!

Nobody likes it when their dogs “misbehave.” But can the cure be worse than the symptom? Dogs get bothered by things and if we stop them from expressing their emotions they may get frustrated and may lash out at a seemingly unrelated target. We must be careful that our attempts to “correct” our dogs don't create bigger problems down the road. There are better ways to help them cope.

I had a fun encounter with my sister's dog this past week. It gave me an opportunity to teach my sister something interesting. Sometimes the best thing we can do to improve our dog's behaviour is less. And sometimes the best thing to do...is nothing at all. Our dogs may be rewarded by our attention for certain behaviours even if that attention is intended to scold them or show our disapproval. We need to be careful what we reward especially when we intend the opposite!

There's an old saying - "There is no such thing as a free lunch."  Put another way, you could also say that "Nothing in life is free."  If you have a dog, there's a program by that name (NILIF for short) that can help you teach your dog that their behaviour has consequences both good and bad.  Many of the websites that describe NILIF programs portray it as a way to gain control of your dogs behaviour, a sort of boot-camp to get them back in line if they are "getting away" with misbehaving.  But it can be a lot more than that. B.F. Skinner said that "Consequence dictates behaviour."  That is the essence of the NILIF program.  But Skinner's Operant Conditioning model can make a simple program like NILIF into so much more.  With some additional reading and some creative application of behavioural psychology, Operant Conditioning can pave the way for a very fulfilling and wonderful relationship with your dog.

It is the year 2012.   The 21st century.  This is an era that was supposed to show me flying cars, tours to the moon, an end to disease, and more.  At least that's how it was portrayed decades ago when I was a child.  And while modern science has indeed brought about many miracles, we still seem to be in the "dark ages" when it comes to training and living with our closest animal companion, the dog. In an era when the Internet puts the worlds knowledge at our fingertips, I am amazed that there is still so much disagreement about the biology and behaviour of dogs.  We have come so far in so many fields.  But people still believe that dogs are status seekers in a struggle with us for "dominance", that a dog must "respect" their human, and that an animal that has been selectively bred to live in our homes could lash out at any moment unless tightly controlled.

Is your dog smart? I certainly think my dogs are.  Most dog owners have lots of stories to show how smart their dogs are. Dogs do have some pretty amazing abilities from stealing a snack from time to time from a counter to knowing which shoes we wear when we take them for a run at the part.  And those are things they learn on their own. The variety of behaviours people have been able to teach dogs, it's pretty remarkable.  We can teach them useful skill and amazing tricks but the fact remains that we have underestimated dogs and their abilities for centuries.  It turns out that they can do many things better and faster than humans.  Their scent detection makes them excellent at police work and helping diagnose medical conditions.  What amazing things will we discover they can do?

Rizzo arrived here in our home just over 2 years ago.  We had just lost our dear Vince who had been with us for 10 years.  Vince was a dog who taught us a great deal.  Rizzo the puppy pranced into our lives.  Rizzo the dog still prances as he runs today.  My Adventures In Puppyhood articles has given me the opportunity to share the process and progress in raising Rizzo. ”Each dog better than the last.”  It was a goal my wife and I set for ourselves 9 years ago.  Our move to training our dogs with behavioural science and positive methods changed how we did things with our dogs pretty radically. Raising our newest puppy was no exception.   Instead of trying to keep unwanted behaviours in check and just teaching basic manners, we had much greater expectations.   We wanted to see how much we could teach Rizzo about the world in addition to the behaviours we wanted from him.