Category Archives: Dog Training

08/29/12

Put your Problem on Cue (Dunbar)

This post is part of the series in response to Dunbar’s 2012 Australian seminars. See index.

Dunbar advocates putting the 8 big behavioural problems on cue, and then training the opposite.  The idea is that you can cue the ‘opposite’ (non-problematic) behaviour when the dog is displaying the problem behaviour.  The problem behaviour should be taught first, as he thinks dogs are more likely to display ‘the most recently taught’ behaviour.  These 8 behaviour problems, and their opposites, are:

 

Large white and brindle wire haired cross breed sleeping

“Settle down” – a useful behaviour to cue dogs to perform when they’re jazzed up or over enthused.

1. Jazz Up / Settle Down

Often dogs can be over excited, over stimulated, or generally ‘worked up’ and this can be problematic for owners.  For this reason it is useful to have a ‘settle down’ cue, but Dunbar of course suggests that you teach the opposite, too – a ‘jazz up’ cue.  You could turn this into a class game where the winner is the person who settles down their dog the fastest, or meets a 3 second deadline.  Teaching a dog to ‘jazz up’ is also easy, and often inspires and motivates class members to train.

‘Settle down’ is useful when trying to prevent problematic behaviours, such as excitement at the front door, or fence-fighting behaviour.  ‘Jazz up’ could also, potentially, be useful reward in the obedience ring.  Diane Baumann, in her traditional training book Beyond Basic Obedience, encourages owners to have an exciting cue (like ‘jazz up’) to mean an exercise is finished.

 

2. Woof / Shush Continue reading →

06/17/12

Reward Training Techniques (Dunbar)

This post is part of the series in response to Dunbar’s 2012 Australian seminars. See index.

Dunbar described five reward training techniques:

 

 

Lure Reward Training
He called these ‘techniques that cause the behaviour’ and the ‘Plan A’ of dog training – that is, it should be the first option when teaching a dog a behaviour.  More about this method is outlined in my lure reward training post.

 

All or none reward training
Dunbar created ‘all or none’ reward training after thinking about dogs in shelter situations.  These dogs need to default to good behaviour, or just be ‘good’ without any verbal cues.  In all or none reward training, you just wait for the animal to do what you want, and reward it.  For example, if you have a dog on leash and wait long enough, they’ll eventually sit.  The term ‘all or none’ comes from the behaviour: He’s either sitting, or he’s not.  Dunbar advocates this way for inattentive or ‘crazy’ dogs, and suggests it should be the ‘Plan B’ in dog training.

 

Black and white working cross breed runs with a tennis ball in mouth.

Life rewards: Running, playing fetch. Much better than any boring treat!

 

Shaping (often with clickers) Continue reading →

05/17/12

Seven Steps to Off Leash Reliability

This post is part of the series in response to Dunbar’s 2012 Australian seminars. See index.

A reliable recall is often difficult to train.  Dunbar has many suggestions on training a dog to be reliable off-leash – however, he doesn’t teach a recall as such, more cues at a distance.  The logic is that it is just as useful for your dog to sit immediately, on cue, in any context, as it is for you to train a recall – and perhaps even better if you do not want your dog to move towards you (for example, if there was ongoing traffic or other hazards associated with approaching you).  Dunbar’s logic is partly based on not removing a dog from their rewards, as well.  For most dogs, being off leash is associated with a lot of fun, and calling a dog away from that fun is inherently punishing, despite any rewards you think you may offer.

Without further ado, here is Dunbar’s seven steps to off leash reliability.

 

Small back and tan crossbred dog running towards camera.

Photo © Ruthless Photos.

 

Continue reading →

05/10/12

Repetitive Reinstruction (Dunbar)

This post is part of the series in response to Dunbar’s 2012 Australian seminars. See index.

Dunbar advocated what he called ‘repetitive reinstruction’ as a form of verbal punishment for dogs that do not obey a trained cue.

He called this technique negative punishment (taking away something good), but this only happens if you are always rewarding the behaviour in the first place. Repetitive reinstruction is taking away the ‘nice sweet speaking person’ and you get ‘annoying and over the top’ person. It works quickly, and response reliability increases after successive trials.

Staffordshire bull terrier crossbreed smiling at the camera.

This is Dexter, a young Staffy X available for adoption through Adelaide All Breed Dog Rescue. Click his picture to visit their Facebook page.

 

The best way to illustrate this technique is by describing training a distance sit.  Here is the process:

1) While the dog is playing, grab the dog by the collar, give them a treat, then release them to continue play.

2) While the dog is playing, grab the dog by the collar, ask for a sit, give treat, and then release them to continue play.

3) Without touching the dog, cue sit, then grab the collar, give a treat, and send them to play.

4) From a casual position, cue “sit” as many times as necessary (perhaps decreasing distance and increasing urgency in voice) until the dog sits.  Once the dog sits, release the dog, ask for a second sit, reward when the dog sits on the first cue, treat the dog, and send it to go play.

 

In this way, the dog is repetitively reinstructed to perform the behaviour until it does so.  Though this may be a number of cues in the first instance, over time, the number of cues will reduce to 1-2 cues.  He assures us that this does work – the number of responses increases per the number of cues, over time.

Dunbar acknowledges that collar grabs should always be associated with good things, in order to reduce the likelihood of dog bites from this interaction (touching a dog collar is often a precursor to a dog biting).

Obedience competition has made a second cue a ‘crime’.  In reality, we are aiming for one cue eventually, but it’s okay to use multiple cues in training. Dunbar has collected figures to graph the improvement and there is an improvement over time (i.e. the number of cues diminishes).

Not only is this repetitive reinstruction, it is also specific redirection.  It is instructing the dog what to do in order to stop the negative punishment.  This can be a useful way to direct the dog during ‘crazy times’ (when the dog is over aroused, like when the doorbell goes).

Dunbar argues that the cue doesn’t become ‘irrelevent’, because if the dog doesn’t perform the first time, the cue was irrelevant anyway.

This is one of the more controversial suggestions from Dunbar, with many dog trainers advocating for one cue only.

 

Suggested further reading:

Patricia McConnell on repeated cues.

“Rover, sit. Sit. SIT. SitSitSit!!!” – a review of Dunbar’s suggestions by Boulder Dog.

05/7/12

Dunbar on Classical Conditioning

This post is part of the series in response to Dunbar’s 2012 Australian seminars. See index.

Dunbar believes Classical Conditioning is a big deal in dog training.  He doesn’t believe in separating Operant Conditioning from Classical Conditioning. To Dunbar, the dog learns the same thing: In case of x, good things happen, and in case of y, bad things happen.

White poodle.

For a basic overview of classical conditioning:  Classical conditioning was named by Pavlov, who learnt that if he rung a bell before feeding dogs, overtime, the dogs would start to saliva

te at the sound of the bell alone.  Basically, classical conditioning is associative learning.  Dogs will associate things with certain stimuli.  In Dunbar’s view, however, he thinks that the brilliance of classical conditioning has been lost over time.  In his opinion, just because Pavlov worked with a reflex (i.e. the dog couldn’t choose to salivate, it happened itself), doesn’t mean that classical conditioning is only used for reflexes.  (This is normally the distinctive difference between classical conditioning and operant conditioning, but Dunbar ignores it and finds it irrelevant. Confusing!)

 

Classical conditioning should happen all through a dog’s life.  Treats should never be phased out for classical conditioning.  Dunbar said, “Don’t take you dog’s temperament for granted” and “If your dog is friendly, it can be friendlier”.

Dunbar particularly advocated Classical Conditioning for improving handling of dogs.  Particularly, classically conditioning collar grabs and other contact the dog may find unpleasant.

He talked about dog trainer Bill Campbell’s ‘jolly routine’, which is an over-the-top play response an owner ‘performs’ when a stimulus is seen.  The idea is the dog things, “Whenever my owner sees x, they get so happy!” – which in terms classically conditions the dog to like x.

While he believes there is better ways of getting rid of problem behaviour, he did talk about using ‘lightning strike’ verbal feedback for poor behaviour.  He described this as punishment in a praise sandwich.  For example, the dialogue would go: “good dog, very well done, lovely dog, excellent, good, good, yes, ASSHOIFJIDSHKLJ!!!, yes, good dog, good, very good”.

He also liked the use of classical conditioning in shelters, particularly in the Open Paw program, where dogs are rewarded for just being in the shelter and seeing people.

Dunbar describes classical conditioning as a ‘winning strategy’.

Further reading: my lecture notes from Paul McGreevy on Classical Conditioning.

External link:  Roger Abrantes’ post on “Unveiling the myth of reinforcers and punishers” 

Updated with additional notes 13/10/12.