{"id":1655,"date":"2012-10-23T18:58:23","date_gmt":"2012-10-23T08:28:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/leemakennels.com\/blog\/?p=1655"},"modified":"2021-08-02T17:39:12","modified_gmt":"2021-08-02T07:09:12","slug":"dog-training-doesnt-happen-in-a-laboratory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/leemakennels.com\/blog\/dog-behaviour\/dog-training-dog-behaviour\/dog-training-doesnt-happen-in-a-laboratory\/","title":{"rendered":"Dog training doesn\u2019t happen in a laboratory!"},"content":{"rendered":"

This post is part of the series in response to Dunbar’s 2012 Australian seminars. See\u00a0index<\/a>.<\/small><\/small><\/p>\n

Along with Dunbar\u2019s criticisms of the four quadrants of operant conditioning<\/a>, he also criticised learning theory for being \u201cmostly irrelevant\u201d to pet dog training.\u00a0 \u2018These days\u2019, learning theory is common knowledge for most dog trainers, but Dunbar considers it to be mostly irrelevant in the \u2018real world\u2019 of dog training.<\/p>\n

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Outside of the laboratory is a whole wide world of training environments and possible rewards. So why are we so caught up on learning theory?<\/p><\/div>\n

Much of learning theory has been established by computer-use of reinforcements and punishments.\u00a0 To Dunbar, this means the findings of learning theory, as delivered a lab, is only relevant to lab settings.\u00a0 In a laboratory, the subjects are normally rats or pigeons, computers control the training, and the animals are contained. \u00a0In the real world of dog training, humans are not computers (they are inconsistent), dogs are more complex than rats and pigeons, dogs escape from people (aren\u2019t contained), and dogs bite!<\/p>\n

But humans have an advantage: Humans have voice and can moderate their tone to reward and punish.\u00a0 Computers cannot use verbal rewards or punishments, and so research on verbal feedback<\/a> is almost entirely neglected.\u00a0 Dunbar encourages verbal feedback to train recalls<\/a>, and claims it is easy to do. \u00a0He believes that verbals are more expressive than clicks, jerks and shocks.\u00a0 Verbals can describe how desirable behaviour was and also an appropriate alternative behaviour.<\/p>\n

Punishment may be effective in a laboratory, but (to quote his handout)\u00a0“people are inconsistent and so the dog quickly learns those times when he will not be punished, i.e., when the owner is physically-absent (dog at home alone), physically-present but functionally absent (dog off leash), or physically-present but mentally absent (owner day-dreaming or making a phone call).”\u00a0 On top of this, owners normally have bad timing, and dogs learn to be separated from their owners to avoid punishments. \u00a0(See also: Dunbar\u2019s thoughts on punishment<\/a>.)\u00a0 Dunbar described people as \u201cscrewed before we start\u201d if we seek to replicate laboratory settings in real-world dog training.<\/p>\n

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Dunbar presented a set of pros and cons between humans and computers.<\/p>\n

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Computer Pros:<\/strong><\/p>\n