My friend trains PP and has somehow come to the conclusion that if you
never tell the dog it's wrong, and only tell it when it's RIGHT, it will
develop into a confident dog and will by choice always make the right
choices.

Yet, even humans, when not corrected, will take wrong paths, and assume
they are right, simply because they were never challenged. And when things
go haywire, they never understand that they took a wrong path in the first
place.. It never enters their mind.

I like the marker ideas to mark a behavior. I like luring as a puppy to get
a behavior and I like the reward/barter system. I think a dog that can earn
it's way to better things also makes a more confident thinking dog, as they
try to figure out how to earn more things. It develops ambition.

I like shaping a behavior as it makes a dog think. Thinking dogs are very
important in my book, and it helps develop a dog's awareness.

There are many positive things to positive training. But as soon as someone
says they are taking PP training, it's as if someone is scraping a
blackboard to me.

And invariably this person has the world's worst dogs.

Somewhere, somehow, someone has teaching PP wrong, in that the students
have the idea that you can love a dog into all right behaviors. Sheer
force of love will bring the dog around.

Ian Dunbar helped develop the training curriculum for petsmart. I totally
respect Ian Dunbar. But the Petsmart training program? Not so much. In
fact, not at ALL.
Any experienced person can take a dog with no training and make it look
great. But when the owners start getting the method, and their dog
responds, they think this is the shining path. It's the ONLY way to train.
And some dogs DO quite well with it. But the average dog , it works for
awhile, and then the owner wonders why it suddenly stopped working, when
the dog is full, or finds more interesting things to do.

When they go back to the instructor, the instructor blames the owner. The
owner runs around with a guilt complex AND a spoiled dog. They take the
dog back into the little cubicle at Petsmart, and because the instructor is
the most interesting thing going on there at the time, the dog obeys.
SEE? It's YOU!!
And the owner goes home thinking , I've followed all the instructions, so
it's NOT me. I have a lemon dog. Or maybe they do think they suck, when
it's simply that the training never offered them all the necessary tools.

When I have seen well behaved PP dogs, if I dig deeply enough, I discover
the owners HAVE deviated from the PP shining path at different points.

I see a PP instructor's dogs wearing prong collars.

Ian Dunbar does believe in correcting a dog. So I can't believe how
convoluted this PP stuff has become, and it's politically incorrect to
definitively let your dog know it's made a wrong choice.

Generally, I feel PP has some great ideas that work. And if you apply them
with good timing, but then, make a correction swift, definitive, and then
OVER, you have a great recipe.

But it seems corrections are politically incorrect. How do people think
this is really going to work?
Is the PP philosophy gone so far that shelters are filling up with
hopeless dogs that merely respond to a simple correction?
I guess we will never know.

I know this puppy that my friend is training responds to a very LITTLE
correction. His training is mostly positive (all positive with her) and she
wants to send him back to the breeder, because he's faulty. I've had him a
couple days, made one correction, and he's the most respectful, thoughtful,
willing to please, try never to do wrong, attentive puppy.

It takes so little to turn him around. This puppy is WONDERFUL, and because
this person's PP is not working, as she needs to be willing to make a
correction, there is a huge breakdown in communication with them. This
puppy wants things spelled out clearly. Once he understands, he's on your
side.

It's not fathomable to me that someone would take a 12 week old puppy and
mark him as a bad dog.

She thinks I got the best of the two brothers. I got the good one. She got
the bad one. And both puppys are everything they were ever bred to be. I
want the whole litter!

Amazing.

elegy spoke these words of wisdom in
: *shrug* i don't know if
i'll be successful. it's been a lesson in
self-control for me anyway, as my instinct with the bullydogs has been
physical corrections in areas where i now refuse to correct steve. i
don't know how fair the comparison will be in the end as steve is my
first puppy and steve is a completely different animal.


I'm interested in how this all works out.
You have never asked very much of your dogs, and everytime you started to,
they broke down (Not your fault, just bad breeding)

This is your first "performance" dog, and I am interested in seeing how
successful you get, before the "Never say no" theory finally fails.

elegy wrote:

On Sat, 24 Jan 2009 06:43:29 -0600, diddy none wrote:


My friend trains PP and has somehow come to the conclusion that if you
never tell the dog it's wrong, and only tell it when it's RIGHT, it will
develop into a confident dog and will by choice always make the right
choices.

Yet, even humans, when not corrected, will take wrong paths, and assume
they are right, simply because they were never challenged. And when things
go haywire, they never understand that they took a wrong path in the first
place.. It never enters their mind.


the step that you're missing, i think, is that you don't let the
beginning dog take the wrong path in the first place, at least not
very far. you set up the scenario so that the easiest choice is the
right choice, and reward that heavily until the dog understands. then
you make it more challenging and start changing the dynamics so that
the right choice becomes the more challenging one to make and the
wrong choice becomes the easier one to make. but you have to make sure
the dog understands the task in the first place. when you're talking
life skills, you have to control and limit the dog's world while they
learn manners and then start challenging those manners gradually.

Actually, neither of these is PP. Honestly, in behavioral parlance, PP
is Positive Punishment. What I think Diddy means is Purely Positive.
Which, of course, is impossible.

But disregarding the terminology and that no real trainer worth their
salt ever says there's such thing as "pure" positive, the concept of
"never let the dog be wrong" is also in opposition to what most clicker
trainers and other so-called "operant" trainers do. I say so-called
operant because people say operant when they mean clicker and no
physical punishment, when really Skinnerian operant training covers all
aspects of training, from Positive Reinforcement through to Positive
Punishment (i.e., an ear pinch is operant, a click is operant).

In clicker training, we discard the concept of "right" and "wrong." We
simply shape behaviors. We allow the dog to explore all kinds of options
on his or her way to the finished product we want. And (this is very
important) we do not correct them for anything they offer. We simply
reward them when they offer what we want. We ignore what we don't want.
The dog begins to actively explore options in order to try to find
something we will reward him for, and learns rapidly to discard options
that don't get him what he wants. Allowing him to make what we would
call "mistakes," is CRITICAL to success. It's an integral part of the
conversation that is going on. "Hey! Does this work? Hmmmm. No click,
that means that's not it. How about this?"

If dogs are never allowed to be "wrong," (i.e, explore options that we
don't want them to retain) they begin to be afraid to offer new things
because we've demonstrated that it's not allowed. This concept is one of
the most difficult to get across to traditional trainers. Because gee,
if the dog is allowed to be wrong and not corrected for it, they'll
never learn to have any sort of discipline at all.

But Skinner and training are extremely clear. An action which is
rewarded is repeated. An action which has no reward is extinguished. The
problem comes in when an action has a reward we humans would not choose.
We call these (duh) self-rewarding behaviors. Chasing the cat/squirrel.
Getting into the trash can, etc. How on earth can we fix that if we
can't correct it and can only reward what we do want? The dog is still
getting into the effing trash, and offering it a treat ain't gonna work.

There are actually really good ways to deal with it without physical
correction but this post is already way to long and pontificaty (is that
a word?). Anyway, to make it really short, the decision can't between
the human and the cat/trash/squirrel, it must be between the human and
nothing.

elegy wrote:

On Sat, 24 Jan 2009 06:43:29 -0600, diddy none wrote:

*shrug* i don't know if i'll be successful. it's been a lesson in
self-control for me anyway, as my instinct with the bullydogs has been
physical corrections in areas where i now refuse to correct steve. i
don't know how fair the comparison will be in the end as steve is my
first puppy and steve is a completely different animal.


Have you read Sue Ailsby's Levels training stuff? It's brilliant and a
*great* way to start a puppy. Not aimed at any particular sport, it's
using the clicker and reward training to set the dog up to be ready to
learn anything you want to teach in very short order.

http://www.dragonflyllama.com, and look at Levels training. Very clear
and easy to understand.

diddy none wrote in :

My friend trains PP and has somehow come to the conclusion that if you
never tell the dog it's wrong, and only tell it when it's RIGHT, it
will develop into a confident dog and will by choice always make the
right choices.

From experience, I can tell you that a sensitive, cooperative dog may also
conclude that every unpraised or unrewarded action is wrong. That's a lot
of wrong.

There are many positive things to positive training. But as soon as
someone says they are taking PP training, it's as if someone is
scraping a blackboard to me.

Balance in all things. I suspect that part of the problem is that the
average pet owner with the average pet dog only considers a correction in
the sense of punishment and do not value corrections for the information
they provide to the dog.

--
Mary H. and the restored Ames National Zoo:
The Right Reverand Sir Edgar "Lucky" Pan-Waffles;
U-CD ANZ Babylon Ranger, CD, RE; ANZ Pas de Duke, RN; and rotund Rhia

Mary Healey spoke these words of wisdom in
.4:

Balance in all things. I suspect that part of the problem is that the
average pet owner with the average pet dog only considers a correction in
the sense of punishment and do not value corrections for the information
they provide to the dog.


EXCELLENT

Robin Nuttall spoke these words of wisdom in
news:y4Hel.541685$yE1.259150@attbi_s21:


There are actually really good ways to deal with it without physical
correction but this post is already way to long and pontificaty (is that
a word?).

Your post is not too long when it's very interesting. Pontificate on!

diddy wrote:
Robin Nuttall spoke these words of wisdom in
news:y4Hel.541685$yE1.259150@attbi_s21:


There are actually really good ways to deal with it without physical
correction but this post is already way to long and pontificaty (is that
a word?).


Your post is not too long when it's very interesting. Pontificate on!

Okay. Training is all about control of resources. Now I'm not an expert
in this either. But if you are trying to eliminate a self-rewarding
behavior, what you must do is control the resource, and let the dog know
that you are the key to that resource and its availability.

One way to do this is what Sue Ailsby calls Doggie Zen. So let's say you
have a dog who is quite willing to help himself to your dinner if you
leave it on the table and turn your back. Instead of punishing him for
that, instead teach him that by controlling himself and behaving, he may
get a chance at his reward. Take a piece of really, really yummy food.
Let the dog know you have it, and fold it into your hand, closing your
fist around it then let the dog at your hand (wear a glove if you really
need to). Let the dog nose, push, and even paw at your hand but do NOT
let him at the food. At some point the dog is going to give up for a
moment. At that very moment when he backs off, click then open your hand
and let the food drop to the floor. Work this until when you offer the
food, the dog must offer something else (I wait for a sit and eye
contact) before you click and release the food. You can then move the
food to the floor, right by your foot, and work the same thing. No food
until the dog backs away and (eventually) until the dog backs away and
offers a sit or down and eye contact. The dog learns that he can control
access to this resource by actually refusing to touch it on his own.
Doggie zen. By backing off of something that could be self-rewarding,
the dog earns the reward.

If it's trash raiding, you must control your dog's access to the trash
while working the issue. Dog is on leash, yummy trash available. Dog has
enough leash to go toward trash but not quite enough to actually get to
it. When dog backs off trash and looks at you, even the merest glance,
he gets a click and a reward from you, not the trash.

If it's pulling on the leash, the dog simply needs to learn that in
order to go forward, he must be on a loose leash. I never found "act
like a tree" to be useful. Instead, when the dog pulls, I simply move
rapidly straight backwards. I don't turn my back, I'm still facing the
direction we're going, just moving backwards, usually fairly fast. The
dog must come my direction too, but is often still facing foward and on
a tight leash. I simply continue backwards until the dog actually turns
my direction and makes eye contact. At which they get a click and treat
and we continue forward. In this exercise I very quickly drop the
click/treat and it becomes a game of every time the leash gets tight, I
move straight backward until the dog turns, comes with me, and offers
eye contact, at which point he is rewarded by the ability to go forward.
The dog learns that pulling means they move farther away from their
desired goal. Doggie zen.

If it's chasing squirrels or being fascinated by something (anything!
sheep, people, kids, food outside the ring, a toy), I ask the dog for
attention to get the chance to get what they want. Offer me an attention
heel, and your toy may suddenly descend from the heavens, or you may be
released to go chase that squirrel or kiss that kid.

I control all resources. The dog offers me a behavior I want to get a
chance to have what he wants. If what he wants is something I never want
him to have, he simply never has a chance at it, but ignoring it gets
him a reward. As an example, Zipper is extremely interested in other
dogs and is otherwise very visually stimulated. So we have a rule, no
playing with other dogs EVER anywhere around any training or trial
facility. Not allowed. However, I do allow him, when first arriving at a
training facility or show grounds, or when first coming out of his
crate, to look around to his heart's content. It's just that he gets
nothing for it, and we don't GO anywhere until he focuses on me. I
reward that attention with a click/treat. He needs a chance to at least
see what his environment is, it's just not rewarded.

Likewise, I don't make a huge deal of him sniffing the ground. I think
correcting for sniffing, which is often as not a stress behavior, only
begets more desire to sniff, which then, if corrected, created more
stress and it becomes an endless circle. I let him sniff, but just like
looking around, it's not rewarded and if he sniffs we aren't going
anywhere till he offers me attention and eye contact.

At this point, he has the routine down and he'll bounce out of his
crate, look around for a second, then very quickly offer me a sit with
attention to get praise and a treat. I never correct him for things like
this, his temperament doesn't adapt to it. Yet he's extremely well
behaved because he understands that he's safe, that he can offer
behaviors, that he needs to select the behaviors that work, that he's
allowed to puzzle through problems, that I won't get impatient or mad at
him, and that I control all the resources.

diddy wrote:

When they go back to the instructor, the instructor blames the owner. The
owner runs around with a guilt complex AND a spoiled dog.

I agree with the sentiment of your post in
terms of training. But I think you are
leaning heavily against one form, when ALL
forms of training are just as easily misused
and flubbed by incompetence.

I just met a woman the other day who has an
insecure (shy sharp) little dog. She paid a
very well known trainer (the last name is
certainly known nation-wide) who is *not* a
PP, and who has a list of accomplishments (of
sorts) under her belt.

She didn't do ****-all for this client or her
dog. Wasted hour after hour, and by the end
of it, the dog didn;t even have a clue about
how to "Sit".

The trainer blamed the client completely,
guilt tripped her into thinking she couldn't
handle the dog or the training, and pretty
much fully passed the buck.

A few months later, the owner got herself
some books and tried again....this time on
her own. Wile she wasn't able to work through
the dog's behavioral issues (she didn't even
have a clue how to start since what the prior
trainer had done had made zero difference at
all), she *was* able to get some respectable
(by noobie owner standard) basic commands
using treat training.

I'm not denigrating one side or the other.
But given that I just heard this woman's
story (I'm meeting her later today to assess
the dog and see if I can give her some tips
and hopefully lead her to a new trainer that
can commit to helping her really "Get it"
this time) two days ago, these two sentences
really stood out to me.

And, no mater WHAT method they'd be using, I
suspect PetSmart training would suck Monkey
Butt. Any corporation that thinks 6 weeks is
long enough to learn how to read, how to
assess, how to prevent problems and how to
instill proper training in a varied group of
dogs and their owners is going to have a lot
of crappy trainers working for them. The
occasional gem *will* exist, of course (and
I've seen them), but those usually already
had extensive experience prior to taking
advantage of PS's client base.

Robin Nuttall wrote:
elegy wrote:

On Sat, 24 Jan 2009 06:43:29 -0600, diddy none wrote:

*shrug* i don't know if i'll be successful. it's been a lesson in
self-control for me anyway, as my instinct with the bullydogs has been
physical corrections in areas where i now refuse to correct steve. i
don't know how fair the comparison will be in the end as steve is my
first puppy and steve is a completely different animal.


Have you read Sue Ailsby's Levels training stuff? It's brilliant and a
*great* way to start a puppy. Not aimed at any particular sport, it's
using the clicker and reward training to set the dog up to be ready to
learn anything you want to teach in very short order.

http://www.dragonflyllama.com, and look at Levels training. Very clear
and easy to understand.

Haven't looked at that site in years.


She's got some great exercises in there.