Ask Professor Boo Archives • Three Dogs Training

A Touch of Class

The benefits of our positive reinforcement dog training classes and how they can help your dog go from being a pet to a true family member.

Ask Professor Boo is our recurring, positive reinforcement dog training and behavior question and answer column. If you have a question that you would like to ask Professor Boo, please feel free to contact him.

[dropcap]Q[/dropcap]: What’s so important about training classes???

[dropcap]A[/dropcap]: I have mentioned in previous posts that dogs don’t generalize well. I think there may have also been some mention about socialization being very important with both people and dogs even if you have many people and dogs in your home. We also know that when we teach our dogs we are building a communication system that allows us to prevent some behavioral issues that might crop up later in your dog’s life.

Classes allow us to do a little of all of this –

While…

Teaching good behaviors and manners

You…

Build good communication skills between you and your dog

Which Can…

Prevent a good chunk of behavioral problems

And…

Socialize your dogs to other people and other dogs

So you can…

Help your dog to generalize behaviors to a variety of places

And in the end…

Your dog is happier, you are happier, and life is Good!

In short, while classes may not seem like a good idea in times of economic troubles they are usually the most cost-effective way to a happy doggie household since prevention is much cheaper than damage control.

Take a look at the upcoming classes and see if you and your dog might fit into one of these!

Dogs and cats playing together? Mass hysteria!

The different ways that dogs and cats play and the best ways to make sure that they play well together.

Honey the dog asks:

My name is Honey, and I am a 2 year old Cockapoo. My little brother, Toby, is a cat, and he came to live with us a few months ago. He is 10 months old. We love each other, but sometimes we don’t seem to speak the same language, what’s up with that?? For example, I do lots of play bows, really obvious play bows…. does he understand I am saying let’s play?? When he wants to play, sometimes he stares at me and then flicks his ear… also, sometimes he just bolts out from nowhere and tackles me….. any insights will be gratefully accepted.

Professor Boo responds:

I can really relate to this question. I have a cat, too – her name is Freya and my daddy found her in a tree in our yard.

She likes to chase me around and sometimes jumps at me. I never play bow her because I just don’t play bow easily. My big little-brother does play bow her but since he is 85 pounds she sometimes runs from him when he does this and sometimes she just sits there and looks at him funny.

I have also observed him telling her off when he thinks she is going to get in between him and his food. She understands this very clearly and is gone is a streak of black and white fur when he does this.

From my perspective, Freya knows exactly when I want to play and she lets me know when she wants to play. The same is true with Porthos. Dante doesn’t play with her too much these days. Although cats and dogs speak different species language I think they, like humans, eventually start to understand each other.

Dante doesn’t play with Freya much these days.

But in his prime he and Merlin-the-cat were great buddies.

Play is understood as play based on the consequences that follow

If they are having fun they will recognize it as play and log that away for later reference.

Dogs and cats that don’t like each other will clearly demonstrate their intentions.

Cats can hunker down, ears back, and they may hiss. Some cats will run away. Unfortunately, this can cause the dog to chase them. My cat Freya is a funny cat and she will actually chase me around the house. I don’t especially care for that.

Dogs who don’t like cats will often try to put more distance between them and the dreaded cat by growling, barking, showing teeth, etc. Dogs will more often (except in Freya’s case) be the chaser and chase the cat sometimes in a predatory manner and sometimes to drive the cat away.

Ultimately we can know it is play by the wriggly body language and bounciness from each. Threatening body language is hard and direct – no bounciness and joy can be seen. Either animal may want to make more distance between him and the other, or want to come if for fun and play

Honey, it sounds like you are communicating with Toby very nicely.

It is possible he understands you want to play but remember cats tend to play differently – they like to lie in wait then pounce (it seems they wait until they think no one is looking – but who really knows what’s in the mind of a cat). This could be why Toby stares, then flicks his ears, and then pounces. You have told him you are no threat and would like to play and in typical cat fashion he has understood this and said, “Great, I’ll get back to you on that in my own good time…”

While these are just my observations from my doggie perspective with Freya and even years ago with Tara and Merlin you can find more about cat behavior at this web site: Cat Behavior Associates.

Leadership, or Who Let the Dogs Out First?

The myths of canine social behavior, the misused and misunderstood concept of dominance, and building a strong relationship with your dog.

[dropcap]M[/dropcap]ost social organizations have levels of hierarchy to make them run smoothly.

When we emphasize humans as “Leader of the Pack” vis-à-vis their dogs this does not involve force or physical control.

Traditionally, in most canine and human societies the leader is the one who controls all goods and services – food, play, toys, outside, social activities, etc.

And the leader is the one who takes care of the family/pack.

We hear a lot about showing our dog that we are their leader by being dominant.

The behavioral definition of “dominance” refers to hierarchy in a social organization, not an implicit personality trait or forcefulness.

Example: your boss is dominant in the workplace because he/she is in charge of working hours, your tasks, what you get paid, time off, etc. However, it could be illegal or just unpleasant if your boss used force to support the hierarchy of the workplace. The good boss that has a good leadership relationship with his/her employees explains the order of the workplace at the beginning then he/she uses incentives, bonuses, and commissions to reward employees for work well done. Yet, even with this kindness and guidance this good boss remains in the “dominant” leadership position.

To build a good leadership relationship with our dogs:

We need to teach solid boundaries – like our boss expecting us in at nine – if we’re not, we lose pay.

We need trained behaviors we can request from our dogs – like our boss would ask us to perform our job.

We need to respect our dogs – like the good boss respects that you can’t work 24/7. You need enrichment time.

In the end, it doesn’t matter if your dog walks in front of you or goes out the door first.

In the end, it doesn’t matter if your dog walks in front of you or goes out the door first.

It matters that your dog is not pulling you because you have taught them it pays to walk on a loose leash = Trained behaviors and boundaries.

It matters that you can ask your dog to go ahead of you because maybe it’s easier for you at that moment = Requested trained behaviors.

It matters that maybe this is your dog’s free time to sniff and have some fun = Freedoms you allow because your dog needs enrichment, too.

To be a good leader for your dog, your relationship needs to be built on understanding, guidance, and respect; and you must take responsibility for Learning, Teaching, and Reinforcing.

Leashes – The Good, The Bad, The Ugly.

Good leash skills come with awareness, practice, patience and a solid understanding of what a leash is meant to do for you and your dog.

A leash is to the Dog-Human connection like a seat-belt is to the car-driver connection. Both are safety devices and often mandated by law. Just as we never use a seat-belt to drive our car, we should not use a leash to “drive” our dogs.

A leash allows us a safe and effective connection to our dogs in case of surprises, emergencies, or situations where attention is hard to get or keep.

Once we have trained for attention and other skills a loose leash actually offers us the best control of our dog, and least frustration and stress for our dogs.

Just as we never use a seat-belt to drive our car, we should not use a leash to “drive” our dogs.

Your dog spends most of their time in the yard – Do you need to worry about a leash? There are many times when your dog needs to be on a leash – trips to veterinarians, groomers, walking adventures, classes, etc. Groomers and veterinarians are necessary for obvious reasons. Walking adventures outside their own backyard and classes are necessary too because dogs who don’t experience these things can be under-socialized which often leads to behavioral problems.

To use a leash properly we want to use the right tools wisely so we don’t do damage to our dogs or ourselves and we don’t want to inadvertently teach the wrong things:

The Good – Standard leash is a 6 foot nylon, cotton or leather leash (leather is easiest on human hands; avoid chains as someone usually gets hurt by these). Longer leashes are not standard walking leashes. They are used for training long distance commands.
The Bad – The Tight Leash – All too often the human-dog team becomes accustomed to constant tension on the leash = tight leash. A dog can be stressed and frustrated by a constant tight leash which can often lead to behavioral problems.
The Ugly– The Flexi Leash is almost always a constantly tight leash. In addition to stress and frustration for the dog it actually TEACHES the dog to pull. The Flexi Leash leaves the dog at risk for a variety of injuries and stress responses that can lead to behavioral problems. It also leaves the human at more risk of injury than any other leash.

Good leash skills come with awareness, practice, patience and a solid understanding of what a leash is meant to do for you and your dog.

Positively Confused

What is positive reinforcement and positive punishment and why positive reinforcement is the best and most effective way to train your dog.

[dropcap]Q[/dropcap]: What’s the difference between positive reinforcement and positive punishment?

[dropcap]A[/dropcap]: If Professor Boo had a time machine he would go back in time to find B.F. Skinner and his cohorts and have a stern talking to them about the naming of the four quadrants of Learning Theory.

Positive Reinforcement (shorthand for Positive Reinforcement is PR or R+) and Positive Punishment (shorthand for Positive Punishment is PP or P+.) are just two elements of the four quadrants of Learning Theory.

The other two elements are Negative Reinforcement and Negative Punishment – we will save those for another day.

Positive Reinforcement means that we are offering a timely reinforcer to the subject to insure the behavior is repeated – YIKES!

Okay let’s try again –

Positive Reinforcement allows us to build our bond with our dogs while we are teaching them good behaviors.

Positive Reinforcement is offering a reward (or something the dog likes) immediately after any behavior we want or like so we will get more of that behavior. When we reinforce the behavior by following it immediately with a reinforcing event like a food reward, a great game, the butt scratch of a life-time or anything that makes the dog vibrate with JOY the dog will repeat the action that earned him that great reward. Generally we also add in a praise word, or “marker word,” or clicker to mark the good behavior and predict the reward is coming for the dog. This eventually allows us to fade out the food (or other added reinforcer) so that we don’t always have to be strapped with hot dogs to take our dog for a walk.

Positive Reinforcement allows us to build our bond with our dogs while we are teaching them good behaviors. It helps the dog to enjoy and look forward to learning, and to be more creative and confident in general. Neurological studies have shown that all of us (human, dog, cat, etc.) learn better when our brains are bathed in the kids of neurotransmitters associated with positive emotions.

Positive Punishment means that we are offering a punisher to the subject to insure the behavior will stop. – YIKES again!

Okay let’s try another way –

Positive Punishment breaks our bond with our dog and our dog’s trust in us.

Positive Punishment is offering a punisher (or something the dog does not like) AS* the dog is producing a behavior we don’t like/want so that the dog will stop doing it. When we want to punish a behavior we must apply the punishing event AS* the dog is still in the act of the unwanted behavior (otherwise we run a big risk of actually punishing the dog for stopping). Traditional punishing events have included yelling, pulling on the choke collar or pinch collar, subjecting the dog to any kind of pain from a shock collar to the more severe methods of drowning, flipping, rolling, scruff shaking, or kicking, and worse. Studies have shown us that most of the time when punishers are faded the unwanted behavior returns because remember in PR – we are looking to have the animal repeat the behavior to EARN the reward. In PP we are simply looking for the animal to stop the behavior in the face of the punishment. This means you will always have to punish or at least threaten to punish if you choose this route.

*Note – because human timing in training is relatively slow in comparison to our dogs when using P+ one has to aim for “AS” in terms of the timing of the punisher so that one actually gets even closer to the event to be punished. With R+ we have a little more wriggle room in terms of timing – maybe a quarter of a second, but that’s a lot in training terms.

Positive Punishment breaks our bond with our dog and our dog’s trust in us. It teaches them that learning is at the very least no fun and at the worst painful. It does not build confidence – it breaks it. It all too often leads to more aggression from our dogs. Neurological studies have shown that punishment acts quickly to suppress a behavior because of the survival instinct of avoiding pain and threats; but it comes with baggage in the nature of fears, re-directed and learned aggression, and shut down behaviors based in chronic stressors that can lead to a host of physical illnesses. In summary positive punishment not only carries a host of fallout, it has make you ask the following, “Did I get this dog so I could cause him or her pain and fear?”

When using Positive Reinforcement you must know what your dog likes and doesn’t like.

When using Positive Reinforcement you must know what your dog likes and doesn’t like. If you have a dog who is head-shy then patting them on the head when they do something you like is a PUNISHMENT not a reinforcer. If you have a dog with gastric issues then food rewards may not be a fun thing for your dog. You have to know what your dog loves (remember: makes your dog vibrate with joy) in order to offer him/her that for a reward.

The biggest trick to Positive Punishment is TIMING and being ready to break your bond with your dog while you actually discourage your dog from wanting to learn. Using Positive Punishment could shut your dog down leaving them living their lives like a hostage never knowing when the next scary thing will happen to them. Or you could make you dog more aggressive – studies have shown that one of the biggest contributing factors to aggression in dogs (and people, too) is using harsh (aggressive) correction on them. You might be told or be thinking that your dog is not feeling the pain from the shock collar because they are not responding, but in fact your dog is not responding because he/she is actually overwhelmed with stress and cannot comply. All you will be doing is making their stress bigger.

Transport yourself back in time to when you were in school and answer this question: Would you learn better if someone smacked you in the head every time you misspelled a word or made a math mistake or would you learn better if someone showed you where you made your mistake and then rewarded you each time you overcame each one?

There is nothing that can be taught by positive punishment that cannot be taught by positive reinforcement. In fact, there is more that can be taught by positive reinforcement. The choice of how you wish to treat the animal in your care is up to you.

Boo prefers PR!