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Post by willow on May 16, 2005 9:13:39 GMT -5
I have to admit that I am quite totally confused by what the PP people say and have never gotten satisfactory answers (on any dog site) to my PP questions.
One of the questions I have is on using the word "No". (or Ah,ah, hey! etc.) PP people are against using it, because it is a "negative" word.
My question is: If you don't use a physical correction with the word, how does the dog know it is "negative?" If you just use the word alone, wouldn't it just be a diversion like any other diversion, to break the pattern they are in, such as barking?
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Post by Nicole on May 16, 2005 16:05:13 GMT -5
This is what I think. ;D Purely Positive, and I mean that in the extreme because there are less extreme trainers, do not ever tell the dog when he is doing the wrong thing. This is so he figures out the right thing to do on his own. Why this is a good thing escapes my brain but evidently they believe there is a benefit to this. They distract the dog when he is doing something wrong so that the dog thinks that the distraction comes from the air not from you. This is so the dog is not connecting anything negative to you. So if you say no or ah ah, the dog will know that you are saying it and that is a no-no. I also don’t know why that is desirable and in fact I think the entire extreme PP theory undermines the whole alpha thought process because you are invisible, a treat dispenser and are not establishing your leadership. This must have been brought up because I have read posts by PP trainers that they don’t believe in the alpha concepts. That it doesn’t exist. They are seemingly altering centuries of genetics to suit the training style. This is just what I believe to be the case. I am certainly open to enlightenment.
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Post by Tammi21 on May 16, 2005 16:53:11 GMT -5
Wow it seems like the PP training would make some seriously insecure dogs. But I don't know anything about it.
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Post by Am on May 16, 2005 17:19:08 GMT -5
Depends what tone you say it in, I guess. If you just say "no" conversationally, the dog won't know it's meant to be negative. But if you say "NO!" in a deep angry tone (as people tend to do) I think it sounds enough like a growl for the dog to know it's a sign of disapproval. So I guess that does make saying a word like "NO" in an angry tone a natural punishment, and maybe that's why they don't use it? What confuses me is that dogs growl and snap at each other all the time. It's as much a part of their language as "calming signals" are. Doesn't that mean that growling "NO" at your dog is an effective way to communicate with him, since he is genetically wired to understand it? My dog has the deepest respect and affection for his half sister - even though she growls and snaps at him whenever he steps out of line. I figure I could do worse than following her lead!
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Post by Laura on May 17, 2005 0:00:15 GMT -5
Nicki, you missed your calling, forget law school and open up a training center ;D. And can any one see the problem with this concept class? Anyone, Bueller, Bueller ;D? PP trainers are treating them as independent thinkers with a higher cognitive ability than they really have, bad move IMO. They are DOGS, with limited reasoning capabilities. Yes, they're pretty damm smart, for what they actually possess in brain capacity, but to be treated as equals makes about as much sense to me as telling my 16 year old kid to run my household, pay the bills and keep up with the mortgage, just ain't gonna happen. Guidance and leadership is needed for all creatures that lack survival skills so that one day they can become the well educated upstanding citizens they need to be, and that goes for the two-legged and the four legged variety .
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Post by willow on May 17, 2005 9:22:31 GMT -5
All of you are waaay ahead of me on this, and your comments are excellent. I am really trying to learn and understand, and while I understand what they are assuming about a dogs, mind, I also feel they are totally ignorant of how a dogs mind really works. (to the point we can understand how a dog thinks, of course.)
The concept of distracting the dog isn't a new idea. Old time retriever trainer's used to put a thin rope through the top of the dogs kennel, tie tin cans, tin pie plates etc. to it so they were touching and run the rope through a window of the house. If the dog barked, they would yank on the rope so it made a racket. Guess the dog thought his barking was about to make the sky fall on him, and it worked! They said opening the window or door and yelling at the dog didn't work, because as soon as you went back inside the dog would start up again, and I agree with that. Once or twice of doing this with the cans and pans though, and the dog would not bark in the kennel anymore. Of course, our dogs are not (usually) kept in kennels, so this info. is pretty useless for us, but the point to this is that what PP trainer's do for distraction today is to hand the dog a toy or distract him some other way, in which case, the dog knows the distraction is coming from you, plus he is being engaged in play when he barks, or given something "positive" (a toy or treat) which to me is counter productive and teaches the dog: "I bark, I get a toy or treat, therefore barking gets me what I want." It is actually a reward for barking.
I don't see how that can work. Oh, it may for the moment, and even if a dog learns to run and grab a toy to carry around instead of barking, this to me is also just exchanging one behavior for another. I sure don't want my dogs running around with a toy hanging out of their mouths all the time.
Am I getting close? ;D
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Post by Am on May 17, 2005 16:34:07 GMT -5
Close, but no cigar As far as I can tell, a good PP trainer won't confuse distracting a dog with rewarding him. The aim of a PP trainer isn't to distract the dog by giving him something nice (unless they're trying to classically condition him to the stimulus), but to redirect him to a more appropriate behaviour and then praise him for doing that. The PP trainers I've talked to think that if your dog isn't obeying a known command, you're asking too much from him. You should take him a little further away from the distraction so it's not so challenging for him, and keep practicing the command there. So if I was walking Monsta in the park and he suddently decided to lunge at another dog, a PP trainer wouldn't correct or reward him for this bad behaviour. Instead, she'd walk him to an area slightly further away from the 'distraction' where he would focus on me. Then she'd have him perform a simple command, and THEN praise him for being obedient. Pretty confusing, huh?
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Post by willow on May 17, 2005 17:51:17 GMT -5
So if I was walking Monsta in the park and he suddently decided to lunge at another dog, a PP trainer wouldn't correct or reward him for this bad behaviour. Instead, she'd walk him to an area slightly further away from the 'distraction' where he would focus on me. Then she'd have him perform a simple command, and THEN praise him for being obedient. Pretty confusing, huh? No, not confusing, I understood that perfectly, but I do think it is ridiculous thinking! Doing it that way did nothing to teach the dog that lunging at another dog is unacceptable. Or....do they feel once the dog is obeying commands perfectly, when he sees another dog you can then give him a "sit" or "down" and prevent him from lunging? No wonder it takes so long to train PP. It is one step forward, one step back the way I see it. Why not just keep making steps forward using a balanced approach that does not confuse the dog?
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Post by Am on May 17, 2005 18:46:17 GMT -5
The idea is to gradually get him working closer and closer to the distraction, until he is performing reliably even under challenging conditions. So when he was behaving nicely within 100 feet of a dog, you'd up the ante and try it at 50 feet. If at any point he reacted aggressively again, you'd take a step back for more proofing under less distraction. IMO it makes sense to deal with a fear aggressive dog this way, since the dog would be gradually desensitised to the object of their fear. However I don't think this would necessarily be an effective technique to deal with a dog that's just being stroppy and naughty. If a stroppy dog never learns that there are negative consequences for some of his actions, how can you expect him to make the right decision? But I'm pretty new to this - perhaps there's something I'm just not getting. I've got a couple of books on dog aggression arriving in the post soon (gods bless Amazon!), so maybe they'll give me a better insight into the whole PP thing.
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Post by ripley on Nov 1, 2005 17:24:45 GMT -5
Old thread but I was asked about this today and figured I'd post it while it's fresh in my mind..
I am a 'cross-over' trainer when it comes to my dogs.. I just find that when they are properly motivated, positive methods work better for them. But this isn't about why I train that way, lol. Anywho, both are trained using classical/operant conditioning-based methods. I think it is a common misconception that those who train using positive methods never say "no" or point out unwanted behavior. I do all the time.
Instead of using "negative words" as punishment, I use it as a marker just as I use a reward marker like a clicker. Only, it is a No-Reward Marker. So, if I tell my dog to wave his paw, and he lies down instead, I say "Uh oh!" That means that he's done the wrong thing, and it points it out for him so he's not left confused as to why he was not rewarded. It isn't punishment, it is just an informative correction, basically saying "Oops, that's wrong. Fix it, please." Once he does it right, he gets the reward and all is forgotten.
I know there are some trainers who even refuse to use NRMs and I think they are the ones that make positive training sound so ridiculous. I don't think ignoring will work every time, I think that sometimes the dog needs to know that they have done something wrong. They don't always have to be punished for it, but it at least needs to be brought to their attention. If my dogs realize that they're doing something wrong, they will quickly change it so they can get my approval. (Because my approval = reward.)
Not sure how much sense that makes, but that's how I use "negative" words. They don't associate them with a correction, they associate them with not recieving a reward.
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Post by masha on Nov 14, 2005 9:27:19 GMT -5
This is very interesting - I think that there are two things to keep in mind when you learn about a training technique that is new to you.
First: no one technique is going to work for all dogs and for all owners in all situations, so it is important to keep an open mind about what works for you, and what works for other people.
Then - there are different stages in training a dog, and some techniques are more effective at one stage than another.
You have to start off with getting the dog to understand what you want them to do. Then you have to get them to obey you.
As far as I can tell, methods like clicker training are excellent for getting a dog to understand what you want, and to teach useful behaviours and tricks - pick it up, sit and stay, look at me. This is especially good as you can get a dog into that learning frame of mind, show them that obeying you is fun, bond with them and all that.
But that does not solve the problems most people have with a dog that is knowingly flaunting your authority. You do need to know how to assert your authority. Especially if you have a big and aggresive type dog.
And certainly my own dog understands perfectly well whats going on when she gets a loud SHUDDUPAYOURFACE and seems quite happy about our arangement. She does complain loudly when she thinks she is being reprimanded unfairly(" Whooo wooo wHOOOAA whmmmggh WHO! ) so we understand one another quite well.
I think this thing about reprimands coming "out of the air" only makes sense if you want the dog to associate a behaviour with a bad experience that is not connected with you - so that they wont do it even when you are not around. So its not realy that you dont want to "hurt the dogs feelings" by shouting at it.
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Post by kaos on Jul 19, 2006 23:26:02 GMT -5
I think we need to be careful when generalising about how to treat aggression. Whilst some people have the perception that harsh corrections can resolve all aggression, many advocates of positive reinforcement training warn that corrections can simply reinforce the unpleasant association and hence actually encourage or escalate the aggressive behaviour. More dangerous still is the situation where a dog is taught through corrections to supress it's warning growl, then bites with no warning.
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