Victoria/Cesar stand off!!

Mattie · Post by **Mattie** » Sun Dec 07, 2008 4:39 am

Missymay wrote:
You could easily replace the word "dog" with child or children.
I strongly disagree. Children have many more avenues of learning available to them then dogs do. Children can learn by example. Children can learn from situation they have never encountered. One can explain things to children.

Having run a pre-school playgroup for many years, you can replace the word "dog" with "Child", we would often see children ignoring others when they didn't behave, the result, the child started to behave so he/she could join in. We used ignoring bad behaviour ourselves as long as no other child was being hurt and it was very successful in teach children how to behave in a group.

Many of these children, aged between 3 and 5 years old, had never heard the word "No", but had everything they wanted, if they didn't they would throw a tantrum, they soon learnt that tantrums didn't work, they were ignored and everyone carried on as if the child wasn't there.

One little girl I will never forget her tatrum, she would lie face down on the floor and using both her feet and hands would bang away at the floor screaming as she did it. This lasted for 20 minutes and we found it very difficult to ignore it, in fact we were holding each other back. The following day she started it again, it lasted 2 minutes and was never done again.

Once the tantrum stopped, both myself and the other ladies as well as the children, all encouraged her to join in with the play. Sometime later her mother told us that she never done this again at home either.

Yes there are other ways that children learn, but ignoring the bad behaviour is a very good way especially when the child is too young to reason with.

Cracker · Post by **Cracker** » Sun Dec 07, 2008 1:46 pm

Do dogs recognise their own reflection as themselves? Are they self aware?

That is an interesting question. The mirror test used with apes has shown self awareness, but not in dogs. The difficulty with this test is that dogs visual abilities are different than ours (different numbers of cones and rods, better dusk vision..etc) whereas the apes have very similar optics. Since dog's main sense is their sense of smell, could a visual like the mirror test be an accurate judge of whether they have self awareness? I think a different test protocol would have to be developed to understand this question fully.

As mentioned earlier, until dogs develop some sort of language to tell us exactly what they know/feel/think we can only guess. I choose to assume they are smarter than we know, in assuming they have greater abilities (not to the extreme, I'm not a fantasist), we can never be "done" discovering the wonders of the animal. If we assume they are "simple", we may be underestimating their abilities and therefore holding them back developmentally.

I try to give the benefit of the doubt to all creatures, even people...at least most of the time...lol.

Nettle · Post by **Nettle** » Sun Dec 07, 2008 2:12 pm

I saw a (televised) test recently where the dogs scored 100% and the apes didn't have a clue. The research scientist was dumbfounded - it was really funny. He obviously had thought up until then that dogs were barely more than perambulating furniture compared to apes.

The scientist had in fact set the apes up for failure but did not realise. Nor did he understand that the dogs scored so high because of their superior scenting powers - he thought they were using visual cues.

The moral is - be very careful what we assume any animal can or cannot understand

It is often human understanding that is at fault.

Missymay · Post by **Missymay** » Sun Dec 07, 2008 5:38 pm

MAttie, I don't dispute that children learn by OC, CC or, as i your example, extinction, but my point was that dogs do not have the ability to learn by example or have you explain what you want and they can do it or many of the other ways children learn.

While dog training can work on children, not all child training can work on dogs.

And don't tell my daughter that I am clicker training her son

cindynok · Post by **cindynok** » Sun Dec 07, 2008 8:08 pm

And don't tell my daughter that I am clicker training her son

Oh my goodness, if it works please let me know. I will try it on 2 --3 yr olds! I will wven try on DH. LOL!
Hugs,
Cindy

Missymay · Post by **Missymay** » Sun Dec 07, 2008 8:19 pm

Doesn't work on husbands. They are abberant creatures, incapable of learning and the one species for which I advocate dominance theory and shock collars.

Nettle · Post by **Nettle** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 4:31 am

LOL Missymay

Nettle · Post by **Nettle** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 4:39 am

I may be misunderstanding here

and if I am I know I am in the right place to be put right - but my experience is that dogs very much DO learn from example, but that they take their example from other dogs not people.

A dog only has to see another dog produce and succeed at an unwanted behaviour to give it a try - for instance a dog previously reliable with sheep can see another dog chasing sheep and join in. A dog that has never jumped the boundary fence can see another dog jump it and jump over as well.

Mummy dogs teach their pups to hunt, if given the opportunity, and some will even catch a rabbit and put it down in front of their pups for the little ones to chase (this behaviour is normal in many predators not just dogs).

In a pack of scent-hunting hounds, the older hounds teach the young hounds how and when to respond to the huntsman's horn and voice.

I submit that if animals of any kind didn't learn by example they'd pretty soon become extinct.

Mattie · Post by **Mattie** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 4:40 am

Missymay wrote:MAttie, I don't dispute that children learn by OC, CC or, as i your example, extinction, but my point was that dogs do not have the ability to learn by example or have you explain what you want and they can do it or many of the other ways children learn.

Dogs do learn by example, I used to have a dog that never barked, he was about a year old when my mother's dog came to stay, Saturday lunch time to Sunday tea time. Mother's dog would bark when he wanted to come into the house, just the one woof, before he went home, Sweep was also doing just the one bark to come in and continued to do this for the rest of his life.

I have noticed when I bring a new dog into my pack, the new dog soon picks up quite a bit of the behaviour of my other dogs, I put a lot of Tilly's good behaviour down to following the example of my other dogs. There are things I had to teach her, but there are quite a few that I didn't, she followed the others.

I agree, you can't teach a dog by explaining to them, life would be so much easier if we could.

While dog training can work on children, not all child training can work on dogs.

And don't tell my daughter that I am clicker training her son

The principles of training are the same for everything we teach, dogs, humans, horses etc. but we do have to adapt to the species. When I had the pre-school playgroup, the boys had to be taught differently to the girls in quite a lot of instances. As these children were aged between 3 and 5, they couldn't read so getting them to read something to teach them couldn't happen, we had to teach them by setting them up to succeed then praise them. At this age explaining to them often didn't work either, that usually came as they matured and was possible before they moved up to school.

Mattie · Post by **Mattie** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 4:45 am

In a pack of scent-hunting hounds, the older hounds teach the young hounds how and when to respond to the huntsman's horn and voice.

Yes, and is why hunts teach the young dogs by coupling them to an older dog, the young dog then learns because he has to follow the older dog. I have never seen this but would love to.

Nettle · Post by **Nettle** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 6:12 am

Apologies for the offtopic, but please would you elaborate on how boys and girls needed different teaching, and what you had to do/not do? (this knowledge might help in the training of husbands - or then again maybe not

)

This is fascinating stuff that might well have a relevance to dog training - and anyway I'd like to know

Mattie · Post by **Mattie** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 7:17 am

The best way I can describe it Nettle is think of boys as Terriers and girls as Labradors. The majority of girls were happy to learn once they got rid of their energy, they always had free play for an hour before trying to do anything with them. They were happy to make things and sit to listen to a story.

The boys were more difficult to get and keep their attention, once we had their attention they would make things and listen to a story.

We found that routine and management was better for the boys, as well as really good ground rules.

Not sure if this will help with hubbies, it did't with mine.

Doggie Python · Post by **Doggie Python** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 7:49 am

My primary training experience has been as a people trainer. With humans I found there were those with good technical and task skills, and those with good social communication skills. Most jobs where you deal with internal team members and the public, do require good social skills, OMOAE.

Then, there were those who had "issues" with being able to just plain function in society as a whole. No matter how good their technical skills might be, their social disfunction overshadowed and tainted those around them. This reduced the mental attitude and job function of the entire working environment.

With dogs and humans, and horses, and many other (higher) social animals, OC and CC will be working in harmony with social learning.

Social learning includes direct information exchange through one of the senses or language, and/or learning by example. Observational learning is a primary form of learning by example and imitation. I've found the best way to get a dog to dig in your garden is to have them watch you do some gardening, lol.

Social learning also includes learning to function in a "healthy" and constructive manner within your social group.

In every behavior sequence OC and CC seem pretty inescapable on many different levels. You can remove social learning and function by isolating a being in a box, but OC and CC will still be present.

In the real world filled with other living beings, I always include a social learning component when trying to understand my dog's behavior.

I've also noticed that some dogs, like some humans, have pretty crappy social skills.

Nettle · Post by **Nettle** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 12:42 pm

[quote="Mattie"]The best way I can describe it Nettle is think of boys as Terriers and girls as Labradors.

That I can understand completely

You know, some trainers get scornful when I say different breeds of dog need different training techniques - but they do.

Missymay · Post by **Missymay** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 5:22 pm

I don't know that I would say that different breeds need different training as much as I would say that different breeds are motivated by different things.

With any dog, I would try to find what that dog finds highly reinforcing and use that.

I would still strive to get the behavior than mark and reinforce it. The difference would be primarily in how I reinforced.