Have you ever bumped into this thought?
Recently, at the end of last year, I managed to publish my first book on animal behaviour management with the very same title; Who's training who? (Kuka kouluttaa ketä? - in Finnish).
This is a question that raises every now and then when I've been working with my clients.
..and to be honest I've been trained this way by several animals under my care in my early career as an animal trainer.
It is very easy to get lost with your goal while animals are behaving this way. It all can start from a very small "different" or "unbalanced" nuance of behaviour which we may easily ignore and unaware of what we are actually doing, reinforce it ... and the story continues. At some point we may wake up and start realizing the outcome!
Untraining this type of behaviour may last quite long; especially if the "unwanted" behavioural twist is within a longer chain of behaviours, not to mention a situation that some superstitious behaviour would be involved.
"It's me who needs this training ...!"
I remember working with one cat owner who had some issues with her cat. We had been working on those matter a few times when again we did some analysing of the situation. Suddenly she straightened herself up and said; "Right - now I got it! It me who needs more of this training than my cat!"
From there on the progress was surprisingly fast and just with a few training events together we did accomplish a good start to make the everyday life a whole lot easier and less stressful especially for the owner but as well as for the cat under her care.
Another example could be a couple who had quite a bit of difficulties while taking their dog out. In short - it was mostly the dog who decided the pace of the walk, the direction etc etc. There would be several more examples ie. when animal are expressing their natural behaviour but we may consider them as "bad" unwanted behaviours. This reminds me of a situation where zoo animals were protecting their pen while keepers were cleaning or feeding them - agonistic behaviours were present quite a bit. Animal behaviour (protection of their territory) was reinforced in this situation when keepers left the pen; In a way it was a relief for both but reinforced unwanted behaviour patterns. The solution was to start to re-establishing more positive human-animal relationship by reinforcing positive acceptable behaviour via diminishing pressure and trying to enter the pen only when animals were behaving calmly. Sometimes we need to find out in a more overall perspective what are eliciting stimulus behind animal behaviour and then we may find solutions on achieving our behaviour management goals.
We should be aware of the small changes in animal behaviour or I'd say on any tendencies the animal is expressing. Once we can react on those in the very early stage we are winning the battle a whole lot easier, faster and before the situation escalates into more difficult situation or even into a problematic behaviour patterns. It is also through learning that animals create these unwanted behaviour patterns and once the behaviour gets fixed on certain stage by repetition it's a lot harder for us to untrain or correct the behaviour.
The key element in avoiding the evolvement of this type of situations is anticipation and a close passionate monitoring of the animals behaviour. Be specific what are the criteria for a correct behaviour and stick to it.
Gee - it just sounds so simple !
Variability
Now what has variability to do with this matter?
A whole lot but maybe in a bit different context.
This I think is connected to our behaviour and on what we are expressing through it. Remember; animals are excellent in reading body language even across different species, they learn easily our general expressions. If our behaviour is easily predictable the animals under our care will rather quickly pick up presignals in order to take "advantage" of them (remember their energy efficiency). If the consequence of our distinct behaviour is some what unpleasant for the animal in question it will surely start to change its behaviour. It can be avoidance of the situation or not coming back to owner (in recall) or even a slight change in response time to a cue can be a hint for us that everything is not in order.
Mirror mirror on the wall
I've always said that the behaviour or a responsive behaviour of any animal under our care is all about us. How we response to our animals and how we are reading the animal's behaviour - but also how we behave ourselves while being with them. The animal is reflecting our behaviour or energy level & intensity back to us. In my early career I was taught that if you've got a bad day try not to be too much with your animals; Well, I don't quite underline this type of thinking any more as we do have to be professionals even when we're not having the best day ever.
So - be alert and follow what your animal is doing, how it's expressing itself and if there are any changes in its behaviour react on them in a proper way to keep the every day life with them a bit easier. Observing animal behaviour is also vitally important in the respect of their health, after all the only common language we have with them lies within their behaviour. Even slightest changes in the behaviour of our beloved animal companion can be a sign of a change in their wellbeing.
Be consistent and unpredictable (in a proper manner) and pay attention on any changes in the animal behavior.
Have some Merry times with your animal!
Sincerely
-Kai-
www.meritime.net
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