Author archive: Terrie Hayward

Day TWENTY-21 Day Positive Training Kickstart Challenge

The myth of the “alpha” is everywhere & unfortunately, there are millions of resources from websites, to books, to veterinarians, to trainers who still tout this outdated, incorrect, and unscientific information.

In the 40’s a researcher named Rudolph Schenkel, incorrectly concluded that wolves in a pack fight to gain dominance & that the winner is the alpha wolf.

Somehow after that people decided that successful relationships with dogs would need to parallel the relationships thought to occur within wolf packs & thus would need to maintain a “pack” hierarchy by way of dominance.

This was the popular belief for decades & as such dog training methods & techniques developed based on the the belief in the need to be “dominant” in order to maintain the “alpha” status.

About 20 years later, a man named David Mech published his highly influential book “The Wolf, Ecology and Behaviour of an Endangered Species” & cited Schenkel’s work and findings.
In the 1990’s Mech spent years living with and studying wolves in the wild on & observed the behavior and social structure of non-captive wolves that changed his way of thinking. Instead of witnessing dominant/subordinate pack hierarchies, he found them to be comprised of leader/follower relationships. Mech determined that the existing theory and literature (including his own book ‘The Wolf’) on the alpha status and hierarchy of wolf packs was misleading and he decided to right this wrong. In 1999, Mech published an article entitled, “”Alpha Status, Dominance and Division of Labor in Wolf Packs” to correct this misinformation.
Although it has now been over 10 years since the alpha/dominance wolf pack research & associated theories were found to be flawed & invalid, there are still folks today who continue to promoted this incorrect information.
ACTION: Get a cup of coffee, sit back, relax, & take a good read of this thorough explanation of how things went wrong, got fixed, but how some folks still are working with old info. Educate yourself so that YOU know the right information: http://www.wolf.org/wolves/news/pdf/winter2008.pdf

Often times folks worry that with positive reinforcement we are making animals “work” for food which they think isn’t kind. In fact, the opposite is true. There is a scientific term called, “contrafreeloading” which indicates that even if food is readily available in abundance, animals will often choose to obtain food via operant conditioning such as pushing a lever to get food or via a food puzzle.

According to Inglis, Forkman, & Lazarus this phenomenon appears “to contradict a basic tenet of most learning.” However, it has been concluded that “working” for food allows animals to gather information about their ever changing environments. Which, in the long term can result, under natural conditions, as  “adaptive” thus serving the purpose of seeking rather than just finding their meals.

Does Zoro look happy to be working for his kibble? Notice his body language-waggly body, swinging tail. Judge for yourself!

Day NINETEEN-21 Day Positive Training Kickstart Challenge

According to Victoria Stilwell (television celebrity & positive reinforcement trainer), “As it turns out, it’s scientifically sound advice to be nice to your dog.” This is great news!

Educating & training learners is most definitely one area where the end does not justify the means. This is true especially when there are better, more effective, ethical means to reach your goal. So, the fact that science & behavioral experts also concur that the best methodology is to positively reinforce behaviors makes it a win/win situation & the choice easy.

The question for some folks comes in via the fact that punishment does work. However, it only works to suppress behavior. It does not work to change behavior, nor does it instruct the learner what you want them TO do.

In addition, in order for the punishment approach to continue to function, it must continue to escalate. Moreover, it is reinforcing to the punisher, which is a dangerous slippery slope. Punishment/correction serves to increase aggression, increase apathy, increase escape/avoidance tendencies, & increase generalized fear.

Fortunately, reward based training has none of the above side effects. Instead, we can foster relationships built on trust & love rather than fear & dominance. Which, ultimately, works much better!

ACTION: Think about a time when you may have corrected (even saying, “No!”) or punished your dog. Now consider the evidence. Did this behavior stop for ever & ever? Did you ever have to repeat this punishment/correction (thus it was ineffective)? Now think about-even try this part out!-how you could instead look for some behavior to reinforce? Good luck building up that relationship!