Unsure about negative dog trainers

[DuckEggy]

I think I know the answer to this and need to trust my own gut, however ...

Situation 1: dog trainer shouted at my dog for doing something

Situation 2: I was advised to harshly reprimand my dog and avoid them seeing an animal they were barking at by obstructing them

Both were professionals with a good reputation locally.

My stance tends to be rarely to tell my dogs off as such, reward for good behaviour and try and avoid or ignore bad behaviour or ask for a more positive one instead.

There are exceptions, because I'm human! - if my pup jumped up and hurt me I'd probably shout out in pain - or if they were about to push past me to get to something dangerous in the food bin, I'd say a harsh 'no'.

Generally though, I don't want to shout at them. If they are being stubborn or bolshy, I will be firm but not loud. They are not lap dogs and come from working heritage.

Am I being too feeble? Out of text book and in real life, is it necessary to raise a voice? Barky dog would have continued to bark whether I shouted at them or not.

As this discussion shows dog training is pretty easy to understand but at times is very difficult to put into practice.

Fact
Positive reinforcement works
Aversive training works

Aversive training will have more fallout and will effect the relationship between dog and trainer/owner

Rewards are not reinforcement. They may be in some cases for some dogs but not all dogs.

People rely too much on operant conditioning than classical conditioning.

Operant will always give a dog a choice and the reinforcement has to be high

Classiscal conditioning with gun dogs if the breeder blows the whistle from week 3 or as soon as the puppies can hear when the puppies are suckling on the bitch and do so at every meal time you will have a dog classical conditioned to a whistle and will very very rarely have recall issues.

If the breeder from about 5 weeks when the puppies are moving lures a sit everytime the dog hears a bird (can move it onto scent very quickly after this) the gundog will sit and wait for a command when seeing or smelling a bird. Most good breeders should be doing this.

Also re toilet training all puppies will move to a specific spot to wee when they are very little - as soon as they are moving. If a breeder encourages this and keeps the area clean the puppies will be pretty much toilet trained eg no there is a specific area to toilet by the time they leave the breeders.

If you have a gundog from 8 weeks and always cue the sit when they see movement your prey dog will sit before chasing.

If you work on operant conditioning then the reinforcement for chasing will have to be good. The dog wants to chase so if you just recall, offer food, no way will they see that as reinforcing. However If you recall and run in the opposite direction with a tug toy the dog will find this more reinforcing and will feed into the predatory motor pattern and you will have more success.

Timing reinforcement rate, value is extremely important. This is why many people resort to aversives as they are not able to correctly offer positive reinforcement on all dogs.

Re interrupting a dog as they are about to do somthing. A positive interrupter is really powerful. Have a sound I make a kissy noise everytime I do it the dogs get a treat or something fun happens. if they are about to do something I do not want them to do the positive interrupter will move them on from what they were about to do. No shouting, no aversives but success if preventing the behaviour.

I dont teach a leave it. I have good recall, a good stop command, a wait command a solid down positive interrupter so all behaviours that will prevent the dog doing what I want them to leave without yelling leave it at the dog.

“It's the DOG that decides what is reinforcement and what is punishment. We guess, but it's the dog's individual prefefences and goals that determine which category our actions fall in”

yes there’s that too - if I raise my voice (as in louder because they’re a bit further away or it’s noisy not as in shout at) to one dog he gets a bit stressed, the other will just go… what are we excited about?

“People rely too much on operant conditioning than classical conditioning.”

To be fair it’s usually a mix of both, for things like recall you’re really using classical.

But for things where you’re trying to change a behaviour because it’s unwanted that’s where you’re going more for operant.

But for things where you’re trying to change a behaviour because it’s unwanted that’s where you’re going more for operant.

I'd actually say it was the other way around.

If I am trying to stop a dog doing something, I find it safer and easier to consider the underlying emotion that is driving that behaviour and change that.

The dog is barking because he is afraid? Change the fear (as much as possible).

The dog is barking because he's over excited? Calm him down (as much as possible).

Change the emotion and you change the behaviour automatically.

Whereas if I want him to do something, it's more likely I will use operant. It's a good old debate about whether or not the sit when seeing a bird is a clasically conditioned behaviour or just a really deeply ingrained operantly conditoned behaviour. I think of it as the latter but totally agree that the more ingrained a behaviour is so that the dog does it, seemingly without even making a choice to, the stronger the training tends to be.

I'm trying to think of a behaviour I train using classical conditioning and am struggling a bit - lost in the debate in my mind of what is doing a behaviour vs not doing another e.g. If the dog lies down in the evening because all is calm and nothing is happening, is that doing a behaviour (lying down) or is that not doing a behaviour (anything else more exciting). I think I could debate both pov 😂

Actually thinking about it… it also depends on the dog.

My current two with recall - very different dogs

one it’s definitely classical conditioning because if he has any scope to think then I have nothing more rewarding than some of the things that happen on walks. It’s literally just whistle reward, whistle reward until he hears whistle and doesn’t think. 😂 I do also play recall games and try to encourage automatic check ins… but he does very much treat them as optional extras.

The other much more biddable and easier to motivate with food or a ball - so actually I don’t think he does hear the whistle and come back without thinking, because I can and do, do more varied things with him.

the reason I think people are misunderstanding is because any actions that are aversive like blocking, no commands and physically removing a dog (which are negative consequences) are actually part of balanced dog training.. NOT ‘positive reinforcement only’ training.

Well, imo there's a difference between a natural negative consequence and a deliberately negative one.

So, ignoring your dog when he jumps is a natural consequence of jumping, but deliberately putting your knee up when he jumps or making an unpleasant noise would be a deliberate one.

I'd also say that most of what you describe can still be done using positive training - so, a house line plus treats to remove them from a room or to get them off the sofa, for example, or scattering treats on the ground to teach a "down" command.

One is positive punishment eg kneeing in the chest to stop the behaviour

Ignoring the dog is negative punishment keeping interaction away from the dog until they stop the behaviour

tb neither are very effective in this case.

Most postive reinforcement trainers will train with negative reinforcement tbh. It is extremely hard not to.

Balanced trainers will use Positive reinforcement and Positive punishment.