Leash Aggression / Frustration

[JoeK]

When handling and train the dog in my experiences with the working dog is high in social aggression which I have working on many years, is dangerous dog when he out of control because he biting people in active aggression and very strong dog to hold im back, so we cant have situation where the dog he doesnt know the ruling of what he does you see?

I don't know that you've really answered my question though, JoeK. Why are you assuming that the dog, correctly conditioned, with clicker training does not know the ruling of what he does? Why is this so?

I can understand healthy skepticism. If you've not seen it yourself, why should you believe anyone who says otherwise? I wouldn't. The burden of proof is upon those who make the claim. But you seem to have a concrete reason, not just disbelief, but a belief in some other principle that dictates the necessity of compulsion. This is what I'm interested in, where does this come from? Or am I wrong, and you are simply skeptical?

Is very difficult to train a working dog in bitework developing the fighting drive in the dog without compulsion usless you happy to get bitten a few times or the dog biting someone else is what happens when the dog learns no consequence on the rules. Probably can be done with the clicker in the end, but depending in how many bites you can handle until the dog learning the rules properly? Facing a dog wanting the throat instead of the sleeve with the handler teaching no consequence on the dog is scary for me is not nice feeling on the decoy.

Joe

[Aidan3]

but always teaching him that reaction is not acceptable, but if the dog is not learning the reacting is bad, hes always keeps reacting up his sleeve and when he has reacting up his sleeve, he will react at the wrong time one day could be bad outcome.

But how do you know that he isn't keeping "reacting up his sleeve" just because you punished him?

I can understand using punishment to quickly suppress something dangerous and then start working on building a different emotional response to something the dog has been reacting to, but I cannot understand this claim that punished dogs don't keep "reacting up [their] sleeve" and dogs who have undergone behaviour modification with positive reinforcement and classical conditioning do.

Hundreds upon hundreds of experiments have shown us that nothing is 100% reliable, given enough trials, and none of them would support the claim that punishment is better than positive reinforcement as a behaviour modification technique - in fact, the opposite is frequently suggested.

My GSD was accosted by two bouncing labradors yesterday, one of them an adolescent. Do you know what she did when teen-punk came bouncing into her face like an idiot? Exactly what any normal, healthy, "strong-nerved" dog should do, gave him a little bit of a telling off and backed off of her own accord when teen-punk gave the appropriate signals. Except that at one stage she wasn't a normal, healthy, "strong-nerved" dog. She was sharp, aggressive and teen-punk wouldn't have made it that far.

I don't know that if I tied her to a fence and let teen-punk at it that she wouldn't eviscerate him, and I don't intend to find out. I think my "world's friendliest" Golden boy would take issue with teen-punk if he were tied to a fence. But I do know that my girl can now communicate like a normal dog without having to suppress anything for fear of correction, and without needing me to tell her anything or distract her with food or whatever people imagine we might do.

[Aidan3]

Is very difficult to train a working dog in bitework developing the fighting drive in the dog without compulsion usless you happy to get bitten a few times or the dog biting someone else is what happens when the dog learns no consequence on the rules.

^which tells me you know as much about clicker training as I know about restoring classic chevys

It's not just working dogs who bite people and other dogs. Dogs with bite histories are part and parcel of the business, JoeK. I'd have a lot of trouble paying my insurance premiums if this was an issue.

[JoeK]

but always teaching him that reaction is not acceptable, but if the dog is not learning the reacting is bad, hes always keeps reacting up his sleeve and when he has reacting up his sleeve, he will react at the wrong time one day could be bad outcome.

But how do you know that he isn't keeping "reacting up his sleeve" just because you punished him?

I can understand using punishment to quickly suppress something dangerous and then start working on building a different emotional response to something the dog has been reacting to, but I cannot understand this claim that punished dogs don't keep "reacting up [their] sleeve" and dogs who have undergone behaviour modification with positive reinforcement and classical conditioning do.

Hundreds upon hundreds of experiments have shown us that nothing is 100% reliable, given enough trials, and none of them would support the claim that punishment is better than positive reinforcement as a behaviour modification technique - in fact, the opposite is frequently suggested.

My GSD was accosted by two bouncing labradors yesterday, one of them an adolescent. Do you know what she did when teen-punk came bouncing into her face like an idiot? Exactly what any normal, healthy, "strong-nerved" dog should do, gave him a little bit of a telling off and backed off of her own accord when teen-punk gave the appropriate signals. Except that at one stage she wasn't a normal, healthy, "strong-nerved" dog. She was sharp, aggressive and teen-punk wouldn't have made it that far.

I don't know that if I tied her to a fence and let teen-punk at it that she wouldn't eviscerate him, and I don't intend to find out. I think my "world's friendliest" Golden boy would take issue with teen-punk if he were tied to a fence. But I do know that my girl can now communicate like a normal dog without having to suppress anything for fear of correction, and without needing me to tell her anything or distract her with food or whatever people imagine we might do.

When I was 13 years old, I climbing out my window at night to meet a girl for kissing is beautiful yes, and one night my father he catch me and give me the strap for climbing from the window and he set the boundary and the consequence. He could have ignored me climbing and give me something better to do in my room than kissing nice girl and maybe I stop climbing out the window so he think the problem fixed. But when the urge for kissing girl is strong enough, I still climb out becuase there is no consequence for doing so and I dont knowing any better because he didnt address the climbing and only offered another behavior to stay in my room. Same on the dog?

Joe

[JoeK]

Is very difficult to train a working dog in bitework developing the fighting drive in the dog without compulsion usless you happy to get bitten a few times or the dog biting someone else is what happens when the dog learns no consequence on the rules.

^which tells me you know as much about clicker training as I know about restoring classic chevys

It's not just working dogs who bite people and other dogs. Dogs with bite histories are part and parcel of the business, JoeK. I'd have a lot of trouble paying my insurance premiums if this was an issue.

Tell me how you address handler aggression with a clicker is good example?. Is true story someone did this behavior modify with the positives until the dog bit his face and took off half his ear and he realising up is sleeve is still there. Handler aggression I promising is only way this is fixed for the dog to fear conflict with the handler he loose. In the 80s we have several Czech line working Shepherd Dogs very handler aggression badly I working with these dogs fixing them, but this cant be done in my learning without compulsion because is unpredictable, one moement the dog is fine, then he turn up the leash suddenly with no option than restrain on the dog to beginning the dogs learning.

Joe

[Aidan3]

But when the urge for kissing girl is strong enough, I still climb out becuase there is no consequence for doing so and I dont knowing any better because he didnt address the climbing and only offered another behavior to stay in my room. Same on the dog?

This is a straw man argument but I'll play along. Why were you sneaking out of your room to go kiss girls? Did your dad want you to stay away from girls completely? If this is so, did you not find another way to avoid getting caught? How did you feel about your dad giving you the strap to prevent you having any relationships with anyone else?

[Aidan3]

Tell me how you address handler aggression with a clicker is good example?. Is true story someone did this behavior modify with the positives until the dog bit his face and took off half his ear and he realising up is sleeve is still there.

What was his name? Can we verify this story?

[raineth]

using the clicker in these sorts of ways (i.e. classical conditioning) changes the way the dog *feels* about something.

So by this means you take away the reason for the dog behaving like that. You make it so that the dog has calm/happy feelings about whatever it is. Calm and happy feelings don't go with biting etc.

[megan_]

The OP isn't asking for help dealing with an out-of-control attack dog.

She is asking for help to reduce a mini poodle x's barking. Putting it into perspective, LAT seems like a good place to start.

[JoeK]

But when the urge for kissing girl is strong enough, I still climb out becuase there is no consequence for doing so and I dont knowing any better because he didnt address the climbing and only offered another behavior to stay in my room. Same on the dog?

This is a straw man argument but I'll play along. Why were you sneaking out of your room to go kiss girls? Did your dad want you to stay away from girls completely? If this is so, did you not find another way to avoid getting caught? How did you feel about your dad giving you the strap to prevent you having any relationships with anyone else?

I using this reference for the recognition of bad behavior which often with the dog, the trainer not teaching this for the dog to learn what is acceptable and what is not and instead he lure the dog around the problem like if reacting, he will take the treat and do the focusing heel past the other dog and is working and then he say he fix the dog reacting from the heeling. What he done is take the dogs focus away from other dog onto him the handler to stop the dog reacting, but the dog still don't understand reacting is bad, so when he doesnt heel the dog past another dog he will still reacting and lunging because he dont know better. My training what I do is correct the bad behavior and reward the good and is what most of the trainers in the Schutzhund, police and protection dogs is proving over the many years is best working. There has been a few who try to train all on the carrot with no stick, but I have never seen any good from these dogs training and unless we proving with this dogs that all carrot and no stick providing better dog with more reliable, there is no point from the exercise to do this, yes?

I am saying if the dog is good reliable working dog trained with carrot and the stick and he does everything right, what improvement needing to say that without the stick he would be better working, better at what part of the working I have asking this question before and they say hes good dog but suffering too many corrections in the training is bad. I asking of them, what effecting in his performance had the corrections, what do you see has damaged his performance from the corrections, and they cant tell me that, but they still tell me the dog was trained wrong, but how is wrong when the dog complete faultless performance and win the trial is not making sense to me?

Joe

[JoeK]

The OP isn't asking for help dealing with an out-of-control attack dog.

She is asking for help to reduce a mini poodle x's barking. Putting it into perspective, LAT seems like a good place to start.

Ahhh, see this is the problem with the training I seeing here why it goes wrong. It doesnt matter if protection dog or little pet dog becuase the reactivity stemming from the similar place in the dogs head is just that the ferocios of the reacting is different. You putting the same ferocious of the little dog on a big strong body and big set of choppers is very violent nasty dog, so the training principal to fixing this is the same for the little dog or the big dog, makes no difference a dog is a dog. If the training principal is working for the big strong dog, it working the same on the little dog is just that the application is reduced to suiting dog size, but principal remaining the same.

What I saying is many people often telling me, Joe my Shepherd Dog is pet not police dog so we shouldnt doing police dog obedience, but regardless, is still Shepherd dog with bad behavior so the method used for police dog training to controlling and good obedience working just the same on the pet dog is no different, yes?

Joe

[Aidan3]

But when the urge for kissing girl is strong enough, I still climb out becuase there is no consequence for doing so and I dont knowing any better because he didnt address the climbing and only offered another behavior to stay in my room. Same on the dog?

This is a straw man argument but I'll play along. Why were you sneaking out of your room to go kiss girls? Did your dad want you to stay away from girls completely? If this is so, did you not find another way to avoid getting caught? How did you feel about your dad giving you the strap to prevent you having any relationships with anyone else?

I using this reference for the recognition of bad behavior

Yeah, I get that. It's still a straw-man - it's not analogous, you're using something similar but different to fabricate flaws in my argument. And you still haven't answered my questions, which I'm going to have to assume is because if you did, you'd have to relate the straw-man argument back to the real discussion, thus exposing the flaws in your argument.

I could do this all day, but I'd rather you engaged in the discussion on rational grounds.

which often with the dog, the trainer not teaching this for the dog to learn what is acceptable and what is not and instead he lure the dog around the problem like if reacting, he will take the treat and do the focusing heel past the other dog and is working and then he say he fix the dog reacting from the heeling

To anyone following this discussion, please note that while there may be some trainers who do this, the whole point of the exercise suggested (LAT) is to engage with the scary thing. In fact, just about any modern method for working with reactive dogs actively avoids what JoeK is suggesting here. We do not "distract" or "lure" the dog except in special circumstances which I won't go into.

Look at That is specifically about teaching the dog how to respond to scary stuff while you build positive associations with it. The dog learns that he isn't under attack. The red-herring of the working line protection dog assumes that the dog wants to fight for the sheer thrill of fighting, which may be true in rare cases, but mostly is misguided self-deception from cowboys who think they have the biggest, baddest d...og in town. Defence drive means the dog feels like he has to defend himself, which should be obvious.

There are many roads to Rome, not all of them are alike.

[kiesha09]

But when the urge for kissing girl is strong enough, I still climb out becuase there is no consequence for doing so and I dont knowing any better because he didnt address the climbing and only offered another behavior to stay in my room. Same on the dog?

This is a straw man argument but I'll play along. Why were you sneaking out of your room to go kiss girls? Did your dad want you to stay away from girls completely? If this is so, did you not find another way to avoid getting caught? How did you feel about your dad giving you the strap to prevent you having any relationships with anyone else?

I using this reference for the recognition of bad behavior

Yeah, I get that. It's still a straw-man - it's not analogous, you're using something similar but different to fabricate flaws in my argument. And you still haven't answered my questions, which I'm going to have to assume is because if you did, you'd have to relate the straw-man argument back to the real discussion, thus exposing the flaws in your argument.

I could do this all day, but I'd rather you engaged in the discussion on rational grounds.

which often with the dog, the trainer not teaching this for the dog to learn what is acceptable and what is not and instead he lure the dog around the problem like if reacting, he will take the treat and do the focusing heel past the other dog and is working and then he say he fix the dog reacting from the heeling

To anyone following this discussion, please note that while there may be some trainers who do this, the whole point of the exercise suggested (LAT) is to engage with the scary thing. In fact, just about any modern method for working with reactive dogs actively avoids what JoeK is suggesting here. We do not "distract" or "lure" the dog except in special circumstances which I won't go into.

Look at That is specifically about teaching the dog how to respond to scary stuff while you build positive associations with it. The dog learns that he isn't under attack. The red-herring of the working line protection dog assumes that the dog wants to fight for the sheer thrill of fighting, which may be true in rare cases, but mostly is misguided self-deception from cowboys who think they have the biggest, baddest d...og in town. Defence drive means the dog feels like he has to defend himself, which should be obvious.

There are many roads to Rome, not all of them are alike.

Thanks everyone for all the comments on this thread. It's certainly made for some interesting discussion.

My girl is an extremely soft dog that can lose her confidence from the slightest thing so corrections are not for her. The paragraph I have bolded by Aiden sums it up. She is actually very fearful of other dogs and is basically giving them a warning to stay away from her. When at the park off lead she will generally greet other dogs however if certain breeds of dogs go to greet her (ie malamutes or huskies) she will run away from them (I obviously try to avoid this kind of situation).

So what I need to do is teach her the appropriate ways to respond to scary dogs and build positive associations with them. But what I'm really struggling with is developing my plan of action and the steps involved. If I start with the LAT game how can I set it up so its completely controlled? How can I set this up regularly enough to actually make a difference? How do I exercise her enough without walking around the streets where I can't control possible encounters with other dogs (so many times I've walked around the corner and there is another dog being walked or stopped at the traffic lights). These are the kinds of questions I need to address before I can make the POA.

[corvus]

Do you have playing fields or similar large, open area where you can see who's coming when they are a long way off and have lots of time before they reach you? Would she lose it if she was in the car and a dog walked past? Do you know of anywhere that is fenced or partially fenced with wire so she can see approaching dogs but there's still a barrier so if you move away from the fence the approaching dog can't go directly to her? Or perhaps just pick a spot on your normal walking route where you have good visibility and loiter there. Then you can cross a road if you need to. Assuming crossing a road would get you enough distance. We came across an aggressive little dog on the footpath once and the owner called out to stay away as it would bite. I said we'd cross the road and the owner was very apologetic, but the dog still went nuts as we passed. Despite my dogs being calm, oddly enough. My boys generally only react if they get startled or feel like they can't avoid the problem dog. That's why I like lots of visibility. They have learnt to avoid trouble and are usually pretty chilled about it if they get some warning and a chance to avoid it. One of the benefits of LAT is that it gives you a chance to prepare your dog for something scary happening so they aren't so startled and therefore better able to cope. Perhaps it's not a bad idea to get into the habit of cueing LAT as you're rounding a corner?

[JoeK]

Look at That is specifically about teaching the dog how to respond to scary stuff while you build positive associations with it. The dog learns that he isn't under attack. The red-herring of the working line protection dog assumes that the dog wants to fight for the sheer thrill of fighting, which may be true in rare cases, but mostly is misguided self-deception from cowboys who think they have the biggest, baddest d...og in town. Defence drive means the dog feels like he has to defend himself, which should be obvious.

Aidan 2 please, I teach you about the protection dog briefly, yes.

The dog that wants to fight for the thrill is called social aggression and you finding this in the working dog males only and some of the Bull Terrier is a trait probably in this country finding 10 German Shepherd Dog with true social aggression if we are lucky is rare trait these days is true. But what we do on the protection dog is training fighting drive in the dog, that is not rare and would be lucky to find police Shepherd Dog or good security guarding dog not trained in fighting drive. Sharpness and civil aggression is fear based reactivity is different and working in defensive drive, fighting drive extends on prey drive and is fun for the dog to go fighting is trained response.

In the fighting drive, the cowboy he training this with no obedience to the dog is danger becuase the dog wanting to fight everyone and the handler cant stop im easy becuase lacking obedience training. Obedience is most for the inportance on the dog trained in fighting drive. You cant tellimg protection dog look at that becuase he starting wind up is propeller to take him down, when he look at that, you tell NO and give im a correction to pull his head in you don't need fighting the dear old lady is bad, see?

I understand in the clicker training people the aiming is to kill the aggression in the dog as unwanted behavior and make it go away for ever is fair enough in the method, but what we do is we switching the aggression on and off for the job so we needing to make him kill someone in the fight then lick the little girl in the face and be nice dog like a pet, so this type of training cant be done all on the clicker is not possible and to switch him off on aggression and fighting drive you cant avoiding correction and power over dog from the handler to make him nice dog when you need him nice is the lesson these dog must learn the rules on the game.

The dog begin the fight on deploy in the fighting drive and bad guy he start kicking and fighting the dog. At some point the dog will switch into defence drive in the fear under pressure of loosing the fight and we still have to control him on that state of his mind. At this stage, is no different than the pet dog reacting in fear on the leash is the same mind set on the dogs, see? So control in the defensive mind setting on the training is the same. The point is, can you control the pet dog in the defence with clicker yes of course is good. Can you control the protection dog in the defence drive on the clicker and the answer is no. That is telling me that the clicking method is lacking on the crunch of aggression in the behavior modification and is the reason why I don't using these clicking methods to fixing aggression in the dog, yes? My opinion if the method on the training cant work on the top of extreme, is limited in the effectiveness is my thinking.

I have very much of the respect in some of the modern training is very cleaver and is far better than what William Koehler mastered from the old schooling, no question from me, but some getting too stupid to avoid a correction on the dog to the other extreme of William, he had some stupid ideas on the extreme and so have the clicker trainers on some things too for my opinion. My believing is a bit of carrot and bit of stick is good and the best trainers are the ones who know when to apply the carrot and when to apply the stick from reading the dog getting the best results. All stick or all carrot doesnt achieve the best dog in the training for my thinking.

Joe

Edited May 2, 2011 by JoeK

[corvus]

Can you control the protection dog in the defence drive on the clicker and the answer is no. That is telling me that the clicking method is lacking on the crunch of aggression in the behavior modification and is the reason why I don't using these clicking methods to fixing aggression in the dog, yes? My opinion if the method on the training cant work on the top of extreme, is limited in the effectiveness is my thinking.

Why is your answer no? Is it somehow impossible to use a clicker to teach a dog to switch between 'drives', or to respond to cues with a high degree of reliability? A lot of people are using it for just that. Control doesn't come from the willingness to use corrections. It comes from sound conditioning and clear cues. You can do that just as well with a clicker as you can with anything else.

My believing is a bit of carrot and bit of stick is good and the best trainers are the ones who know when to apply the carrot and when to apply the stick from reading the dog getting the best results. All stick or all carrot doesnt achieve the best dog in the training for my thinking.

The OP has already ruled out punishments. Sounds to me like they know when to apply the carrot and when to apply the stick. Just because they have made a different decision than you might have does not mean they don't know. I have a dog I would NEVER punish. He is just too gentle. He is not confident about offering behaviours in the first place, so if I punish him I'm only going to hurt my ability to train new behaviours. Plus it's just not needed. He has a beautiful fast extinction curve and I've never seen anything spontaneously recover. Oh, except trying to convince us he's sleeping on the bed tonight.

[raineth]

Thanks everyone for all the comments on this thread. It's certainly made for some interesting discussion.

My girl is an extremely soft dog that can lose her confidence from the slightest thing so corrections are not for her. The paragraph I have bolded by Aiden sums it up. She is actually very fearful of other dogs and is basically giving them a warning to stay away from her. When at the park off lead she will generally greet other dogs however if certain breeds of dogs go to greet her (ie malamutes or huskies) she will run away from them (I obviously try to avoid this kind of situation).

So what I need to do is teach her the appropriate ways to respond to scary dogs and build positive associations with them. But what I'm really struggling with is developing my plan of action and the steps involved. If I start with the LAT game how can I set it up so its completely controlled? How can I set this up regularly enough to actually make a difference? How do I exercise her enough without walking around the streets where I can't control possible encounters with other dogs (so many times I've walked around the corner and there is another dog being walked or stopped at the traffic lights). These are the kinds of questions I need to address before I can make the POA.

Hi Kiesha

mamaging the environment is always the hardest aspect of this sort of training.

maybe initially it might be good to set up some artificial situations. Maybe you could see if there are any DOLers near you that could help?

Maybe you have neighbours or friends with dogs that could help you out?

then you might be able to get enough improvement in the initial stages with these articirfial set ups, that you can then take a bit of the risk of heading out on the street.

How about taking her to places (in the car) in which you know there will be dog present, but that also provide a good bit of distance from them.

Also don't feel shy about calling out to people and asking them to give your dog some room.

I do this occasionally when people with their dogs look like they won't be giving us personal space.

for exercise, maybe you could take her really early in the morning for a walk, or play with her in the backyard? Is she really energetic?

[sas]

.

Edited May 2, 2011 by MEH

[Aidan3]

So what I need to do is teach her the appropriate ways to respond to scary dogs and build positive associations with them. But what I'm really struggling with is developing my plan of action and the steps involved. If I start with the LAT game how can I set it up so its completely controlled? How can I set this up regularly enough to actually make a difference? How do I exercise her enough without walking around the streets where I can't control possible encounters with other dogs (so many times I've walked around the corner and there is another dog being walked or stopped at the traffic lights). These are the kinds of questions I need to address before I can make the POA.

Hi kiesha09, it's always best to work with someone experienced and knowledgeable who can help you but in the absence of that I have a few suggestions. You can often work at some distance from an obedience class or fenced, off-leash park. Alternatively, you can tee up some friends to help you out. Other people in your area with reactive dogs are often a source of valuable assistance, because you can work together towards the same goals (just work at the threshold of the most reactive dog for reasons which will quickly become obvious).

It is true that, similar to housetraining, the fewer errors you have the sooner you get there. However, LAT does give you some flexibility because you can almost always find something to click. It is also very efficient in reducing threshold. The idea is to shape in the right "direction", so some errors are not the end of the world so long as you are getting closer and closer to your goal.

[Aidan3]

I understand in the clicker training people the aiming is to kill the aggression in the dog

No. But thanks for the lesson in working dogs, I look forward to seeing your performance in the working arena some day. Have you got any videos of good working dogs you could share that would illustrate your points?