Anticipation and Excitement...

snownose

SirDrakeOfTheCreek

snownose

Very interesting opinions I have read in this thread......I know DPU's record......so, how about the new entry to posting about rescue......how many and what type of dogs have been rescued by you and how do you deal with severe excited dogs???

I agree with many statements that DPU made, due to my experience in rescue......recent resue entered my home just a couple of months ago, and he is doing geat.........cats, rabbit and all.......lol

I'm not sure if this was directed at me?? I quite honestly can't tell you how many dogs I have rehabilitated. The vast majority of my rehabilitation was done in a shelter situation which is extremely difficult, but certainly more than doable with dedication. I stopped counting several years ago, but in 2003 I was up to 83 when I stopped counting. That number is all successfully placed-not returned fully rehabilitated shelter dogs. Over the years I have rehabilitated (rescued) 36 dogs that have actually lived with me while being rehabilitated and that have been successfully placed in homes and not returned. As I said previously I work with the dogs that NO ONE else wants to touch and that other trainers suggest should be euthanized. I have rehabilitated pit bulls, american bulldogs, mastiffs, great danes, chows, akitas, german shepherds, labs, goldens, rottweilers, dobies, huskys, malamutes, and one very memorable scottish deerhound just to name a few. I have worked with more mixes than I can name and many that I quite frankly am not sure what they were. Every last one was abused, neglected, tortured.

As for how I deal with severe excitement: that absolutely depends on the situation and the dog itself. If you'd like to give me a scenario I'd be happy to tell you what I would do, but I can't just pull something out of the air when I don't know what type of situation you are referring to. People's definition of 'severe' excitement is often as different as the people themselves. Although, I think I've already answered this in previous posts?

 

I still don't understand your way of handlng dogs, or even handling them on an everyday situation......as far as I can explain my experience, *content removed, rude*

Okay, well, you asked how many dogs and what kinds and I answered that, you asked how I handled them and I asked you to give me a situation if mt previous explanation wasn't good enough, which apparently it wasn't based on your response. Yet I see no scenario. So, since you apparently want a generalized one-size-fits-all view of my training/rehab methods, fine. I always work under positive reinforcement of acceptable behavior and witholding of said positive reinforcement when unacceptable behavior is presented. That does not even begin to describe the many facets of rehab when you are dealing with TRULY human aggressive and Severe Dog Aggressive dogs. There is so much more than that, but that's the basic principle so is that what you are looking for?

my point was is it fair to interrupt this pleasurable behavior chain by introducing behavior modification/training.  In my example, the trigger for the WANT is the sight of the collar and the WANT is a car ride.  It is a given that the happy/excited behavior is acceptable.  Since the dog is in a WANT mode and in high drive to get that want, is it fair for me to take advantage of that WANT by "making" the dog rollover as a trick before we continue in the chain.

if someone really truly believed this and raised a dog using this philosophy the dog would be unbearable and a danger to himself and others. "Oh the dog WANTS bladder relief but it's unfair to ask him for a trick (i.e. go outside) before he gets what he wants". "Oh the dog wants to chase that squirrel but it's unfair to ask him for a trick (i.e. walk on a loose leash and ignore the squirrel in order to avoid being hit by a car) because he has pleasurable anticipation of chasing the squirrel. Oh the dog wants the hotdog that little girl has but it's unfair to ask him to do a trick (leave it), might as well let him knock the girl over and steal her food". Oh the dog wants praise but it's unfair to ask him to do a trick (sit, down, come when called) in order to get it because he is pleasurably anticipating praise and petting. Oh the dog wants to go for a car ride but it's unfair to ask him to be calm in order to get what he wants, might as well let him shriek and jump and spin and oh whoops he knocked grandma over and broke her hip. Yup. It's unfair.

Liesje

Is is bad or unnatural or unbalanced for dogs to be conditioned (intentionally or not) to get excited about certain things?  Examples: human picks up collar/leash and dog is excited to go for a walk, human picks up food bowl and dog is excited to eat dinner, human starts packing a certain bag or box and dog gets excited to go somewhere....

In my opinion...nope. It's not unnatural for any canid to show excitement and anticipation before getting food...whether they are going to the kitchen to a bowl on the floor...or they are joining up with their pack to hunt their prey. It happens in both instances and it is an integral part of the pack's bonding...the obtaining and sharing of food. It's a time of great excitement but also a time of heavy thinking and decision making for the leaders.

Nothing unnatural about it. Bad or unbalanced would be situational...but definitely not unnatural.

SirDrakeOfTheCreek

I always work under positive reinforcement of acceptable behavior and witholding of said positive reinforcement when unacceptable behavior is presented. That does not even begin to describe the many facets of rehab when you are dealing with TRULY human aggressive and Severe Dog Aggressive dogs. There is so much more than that, but that's the basic principle so is that what you are looking for? As far as your experience........did I ask?

Highlighting of above quote was done by me.  This phrasing always gets to me because its like Punishment is being disguised.  Negative Punishment is one of the quadrants of OC, it works and it is present in most if not all training methods to some degree.  Negative Punishment causes anxiety in the dog and the effect is dependent on how the dog copes with it.  For some dogs and depending on the dog's psyche sensibility, it may be interpetted as Positive Punishment.  So a trainer saying positive reinforcement is their traiining method without discussing how the other quadrants come into play is not nice IMO....I am just a JQP dog owner and I have told my Marvin story time and time again and that experience has taught me a lot and I don't understand why because it is not a bad thing but the shared knowledge would have avoided the terrible experience Marvin had with CT. 

Just a quick question?  Are you a fee based trainer?  And it is very rare here to have someone experience with Human-Dog Agression (HD).  Some members do experience this with their residence dogs toward some people and the recommendations is a managed environment.  But I don't know anyone who has dealt with HD where the dog is agressive to all humans.   The resolve is PTS and decided by those directly involved.  I look forward to post where you share your stories on HD.    My experience with aggression is most always fear based and dog just wants to maintain a distance.  I am sure if I pressed the dog, it would escalate to HDA so you see that is why I start off with giving a dog as much space it needs in order to adjust.  A dog that bites humans is not adoptable.   I do have experience with one SRS dog and that I experience I try to forget.

DPU

If the dog feels and trust its knows where and when he is getting his meal, then he does not countersurf or garbage pick.  Last night, I put my dinner plates in the kitchen sink and left 2 porterhouse steak bones on the plates.  They were still there this morning.  Why would that be a problem for others?

Respectfully, that is simply not true. You admitted in another thread that you've never had a dog that was really into food above and beyond the satiation point, that would eat and eat and eat if there was food available, even if not hungry. You've never experienced it, so you don't know. I DO have a dog like that, and he was never abused, never neglected, never went a day without his 'basic need' for food being satisfied, and he also gets tons of attention and affection because he's such a sweet, loving, delightful dog. For a dog like mine, countersurfing and garbage picking is a training issue. If I don't train specifically for those behaviors, they will not just go away simply because of our awesome relationship. I did not cause his love of food, it was noted by his breeder long before I got him.

You take in dogs that sound pretty well behaved already. They may be dog aggressive, they may be fearful towards people, but other than that they sound like calm, placid, low energy dogs, which is consistent with the Danes we see at the park. How can you take credit for dogs that don't jump all over people when they didn't jump all over people when you got them? How can you take credit for them not countersurfing when they didn't countersurf when you got them? Perhaps it was never in their nature to do so. You fail to take into consideration the inherent temperament and personality of the dog, (which is genetic), as a factor in the end behavior of the dogs you rehabilitate.

To your credit, they did not develop those bad behaviors under your care, but you also never had to DO anything to stop them from these and other bad behaviors, because they never exhibited them in them first place. I don't pat myself on the back that Dena & Keefer were not destructive chewers as puppies. They just weren't. Cassidy WAS, and required a lot of maintenance until she grew out of it. Different dogs, different personalities.

I'm not criticizing your training methods - how could I? After all this time I still don't know what they ARE. I still don't know how you'd address certain common behavior problems because every time someone asks a specific "what do you do about this" question, you admit you've never experienced a dog like that. Maybe you could give a theoretical answer, tell us what you WOULD do if you got a foster with those issues. Also, not everyone has a pack of dogs. How would you adapt your training methods to a household with one dog or even two dogs?
 

Moderator reminder

Let's stay OT folks...discussion of training methods in general...types of aggression,...are very good (if oft discussed) topics for other threads. Feel free to start them...and let's keep this one OT.

Thanks.

ETA: REPOST OF TOPIC

"Is is bad or unnatural or unbalanced for dogs to be conditioned (intentionally or not) to get excited about certain things?  Examples: human picks up collar/leash and dog is excited to go for a walk, human picks up food bowl and dog is excited to eat dinner, human starts packing a certain bag or box and dog gets excited to go somewhere...."

DPU

SirDrakeOfTheCreek

I always work under positive reinforcement of acceptable behavior and witholding of said positive reinforcement when unacceptable behavior is presented. That does not even begin to describe the many facets of rehab when you are dealing with TRULY human aggressive and Severe Dog Aggressive dogs. There is so much more than that, but that's the basic principle so is that what you are looking for? As far as your experience........did I ask?

Highlighting of above quote was done by me.  This phrasing always gets to me because its like Punishment is being disguised.  Negative Punishment is one of the quadrants of OC, it works and it is present in most if not all training methods to some degree.  Negative Punishment causes anxiety in the dog and the effect is dependent on how the dog copes with it.  For some dogs and depending on the dog's psyche sensibility, it may be interpetted as Positive Punishment.  So a trainer saying positive reinforcement is their traiining method without discussing how the other quadrants come into play is not nice IMO....I am just a JQP dog owner and I have told my Marvin story time and time again and that experience has taught me a lot and I don't understand why because it is not a bad thing but the shared knowledge would have avoided the terrible experience Marvin had with CT.

I am sorry you feel that way. However, I DO have extensive experience with my training methods (of which I have already stated that is a GENERALIZED view and with every dog it is different) and I have never had this type of training create any type of undesirable behavior. If it does you are missing something, plain and simple. Whether the thing you are missing is a fear or an anxiety that either you have missed or that has not has surfaced until the dog felt comfortable enough with it's environment to 'test' you with it, in MY experience this type of training does NOT cause these behaviors. It is simply a coincidence that people who do not like to admit they have missed something come up with as something other than themselves to blame. (Previous comment was NOT directed at ANYONE on this forum but is my experience).

 

Just a quick question?  Are you a fee based trainer?  And it is very rare here to have someone experience with Human-Dog Agression (HD).  Some members do experience this with their residence dogs toward some people and the recommendations is a managed environment.  But I don't know anyone who has dealt with HD where the dog is agressive to all humans.   The resolve is PTS and decided by those directly involved.  I look forward to post where you share your stories on HD. 

No, I currently am not a fee based trainer, although I was previously. Currently I am not a trainer at all due to a medical condition that I developed in January 2007 that makes me have seizures unpredictably. I am unable to drive and certainly would not be helpful to a fearful or aggressive dog if in the middle of a training session I had a seizure.

In respect to HD I have EXTENSIVE experience with it, I assure you and would be happy to answer any questions and tell any stories that anyone would like. I will not lie and say I have managed to save them all but I have had a VERY high success rate with them. If someone would like to start a thread about HD or direct me as to what they would like know about and where to place that info of my experiences I could go on for years....... And yes, I am absolutely speaking about TRUE HD. I believe that ALL animals deserve the opportunity to redeem themselves and have been lucky enough to prove that MANY of them appreciate that sentiment.

rwbeagles

Moderator reminder

Let's stay OT folks...discussion of training methods in general...types of aggression,...are very good (if oft discussed) topics for other threads. Feel free to start them...and let's keep this one OT.

Thanks.

ETA: REPOST OF TOPIC

"Is is bad or unnatural or unbalanced for dogs to be conditioned (intentionally or not) to get excited about certain things?  Examples: human picks up collar/leash and dog is excited to go for a walk, human picks up food bowl and dog is excited to eat dinner, human starts packing a certain bag or box and dog gets excited to go somewhere...."

As I stated before the only time that I believe conditioned excitement is "bad" is when the conditioned behavior is destructive, obsessive, or dangerous. Such as racing down stairs ahead of/ behind human, spinning in circles, lunging/jumping up, etc. and in those cases the excitement itself is okay but the way it is displayed must be toned down to an acceptable non dangerous level

Chuffy

I'm going to reply without reading all the replies first.  These are just my first thoughts on reading the OP.

Liesje

Is is bad or unnatural or unbalanced for dogs to be conditioned (intentionally or not) to get excited about certain things?  Examples: human picks up collar/leash and dog is excited to go for a walk, human picks up food bowl and dog is excited to eat dinner, human starts packing a certain bag or box and dog gets excited to go somewhere....

 

Now I'm going to argue the point that the dog is getting conditioned to being excited about those things.  It depends what you do when the dog displays excitement.  If you go ahead with the activity, then yeah, that reinforces the excitement.  If you ask the dog for a degree of self control - for example, "Down", and THEN proceed with the activity, I don't think you are necesarily reinforcing excitement at all.  You are reinforcing calmness and slef control.

My first thought when reading the initial post is that we (the royal we) are not conditioning our dogs to get excited by certain things, the DOGS are creating the associations. As bad at generalizing as dogs are they are just as good at learning associations, without any help or encouragement on our part. That's classical conditioning! You pick up your keys, your dog knows you're leaving. You pick up his leash he knows he's coming too. You walk toward where the food is kept around the time you normally feed him, he knows it's dinnertime. You turn off the lights at night, he knows it's bedtime. These are completely natural associations for the dog to make, and there's nothing you can do to stop them from happening.

As Chuffy points out, we can require that our dogs exhibit calm behavior before continuing with exciting activities, which conditions them to be LESS excited about them. That's basically the Premack Principle. I re-read Control Unleashed last week in preparation for the workshop I'm taking Keefer to tomorrow, and I think Leslie McDevitt's explanation of the principle is the best I've ever seen - you use what the dog wants as a reward for doing what you want, which takes the conflict out of training. The dog does not have to choose between doing what HE wants and doing what YOU want him to do because cooperating with you becomes the path to get what he wants. Dog wants to pull and sniff on a walk, you want the dog to walk nicely next to you, so by walking nicely next to you for a short time, he gets permission to go do what he wanted to do in the first place. The more you try and prevent him from ever wandering off and sniffing, the more he wants it. If he gets permission to do it, it becomes less exciting. This is really the foundation of NILIF. 

Cassidys Mom

Respectfully, that is simply not true. You admitted in another thread that you've never had a dog that was really into food above and beyond the satiation point, that would eat and eat and eat if there was food available, even if not hungry. You've never experienced it, so you don't know. 
 

It would surprise me that you would respond in the affirmative that it is ok for your dog to exhibit Excitement in Anticipation of any food related event.  I don't know you and I don't your relationship or your total dog care regiment, but from the information in your post, it could be when you present food to the dog he eats it and appears to have a bottomless stomach....or it could be an Obsessive Compulsive behavior.  I do not have experience with an extreme OC dog but only those dogs that have OC and can be fixed by providing the right environment.  I did have one family that was interested in adopting one of my fosters and their purpose was to have a companion and permanent playmate for their residence dog.  The dogs WANT for attention was too much for the family.  I made 3 home visits and stayed there entire morning each time to observe.  What I saw was dog with OC behavior.  The dog lived for playing fetch and also playing chase with my foster.  But in between the throws, the anticipation part, the dog would circle.....this would probably seem normal but after the game the dog would walk move around the yard in circles...a very pitiful sight and an obvious case of OC.  It took a lot of talking to the owners for them to recognize this condition and it wasn't until we said no to the adoption that it sank in how serious this was.  Thankfully, they called in a behaviorist and vet to help them.  The question should be How did this get to that state?  Anticipation and Excitement could have been the starting point.

DPU

Cassidys Mom

Respectfully, that is simply not true. You admitted in another thread that you've never had a dog that was really into food above and beyond the satiation point, that would eat and eat and eat if there was food available, even if not hungry. You've never experienced it, so you don't know. 
 

  I do not have experience with an extreme OC dog but only those dogs that have OC and can be fixed by providing the right environment

  

With all due respect most cases of true OC are not "fixed" simply by providing the "right environment". They are most often anxiety based and it takes a tremendous amount of hard work and careful training to calm this behavior. 

 

The question should be How did this get to that state?  Anticipation and Excitement could have been the starting point.

Certainly that question is a factor if that information is available. For me it usually isn't. And yes, it could have been the starting point and no one gave the dog a way to settle down and allowed the behavior to spiral, then again it may not have. Anticipation and Excitement are not synonymous with OC, and that's what it seems like you're saying??

DPU

Cassidys Mom

Respectfully, that is simply not true. You admitted in another thread that you've never had a dog that was really into food above and beyond the satiation point, that would eat and eat and eat if there was food available, even if not hungry. You've never experienced it, so you don't know. 
 

It would surprise me that you would respond in the affirmative that it is ok for your dog to exhibit Excitement in Anticipation of any food related event. 

When I am preparing to eat dinner I sit at the table, place my napkin on my lap, and wait for the rest of my family in Anticipation and Excitement for a delicious meal. At dinner time my boys go to the kitchen and sit in their respective spots, eyes on me waiting for me to place their bowls on the floor. They then look at me and wait for their release command to eat. I did not tell them to do this, they have done it in Anticipation and Excitement for their meal, and because they have been conditioned to do so, just as I have been conditioned to the behavior I said I do above.  They are not abused or  neglected, they have not been harmed in any way and they show no signs of OC. Neither do I for that matter despite the fact that I also do things in Anticipation and Excitement for my own meal.

SirDrakeOfTheCreek

With all due respect most cases of true OC are not "fixed" simply by providing the "right environment". They are most often anxiety based and it takes a tremendous amount of hard work and careful training to calm this behavior. 

 

Yes, I do know this and I also know my capacity to "fix" the condition and my approach of not directly addressing the issue but providing the perifpherals, a right environment so the dog gets a big head start has worked wonderfully for me.  I can proudly say I "cured" Marvin's true SA and he transitioned beautifully into his permanent home and I had him for 1 year and 5 months.  "tremendous amount of hard work".....search "Marvin" on this site and see the work that I have done with him.  Sampson, GD mix had the OC of drinking excess water and having to pee big time and often.  I did not address the issue by controlling the amount of water he drank because IMO that would have escalated his anxiety and he would have presented worse behavior.  My approach was to give him unlimited amounts of water, provide him a stable and structure environment, and build his confidence and trust....the human relationship.  Another example of anxiety within Anticipation and Excitement behavior not being a good combination.

SirDrakeOfTheCreek

DPU

Cassidys Mom

Respectfully, that is simply not true. You admitted in another thread that you've never had a dog that was really into food above and beyond the satiation point, that would eat and eat and eat if there was food available, even if not hungry. You've never experienced it, so you don't know. 
 

It would surprise me that you would respond in the affirmative that it is ok for your dog to exhibit Excitement in Anticipation of any food related event. 

When I am preparing to eat dinner I sit at the table, place my napkin on my lap, and wait for the rest of my family in Anticipation and Excitement for a delicious meal. At dinner time my boys go to the kitchen and sit in their respective spots, eyes on me waiting for me to place their bowls on the floor. They then look at me and wait for their release command to eat. I did not tell them to do this, they have done it in Anticipation and Excitement for their meal, and because they have been conditioned to do so, just as I have been conditioned to the behavior I said I do above.  They are not abused or  neglected, they have not been harmed in any way and they show no signs of OC. Neither do I for that matter despite the fact that I also do things in Anticipation and Excitement for my own meal.

There is no doubt in my mind that your dogs are in Expectation mode and not in Anticipation mode.  By the hands on the clock, by internal feelings of hunger, by the site of food in their right place, they are absolutely guaranteed that the food will be getting in their stomachs.  If you disrupt that routine and introduce the risk they would not be getting food during this human created guarantee time, I assure you their behavior will change and it may change in unrelated situations.

I observe in this thread that when the dog in Anticipation mode it is up to the dog to cope with the situation.  But when the dog is Expectation mode and the dog has been lead to believe there is a guarantee, the human feels they can absolve themselves from the what is expected.

DPU

SirDrakeOfTheCreek

With all due respect most cases of true OC are not "fixed" simply by providing the "right environment". They are most often anxiety based and it takes a tremendous amount of hard work and careful training to calm this behavior. 

 

Yes, I do know this and I also know my capacity to "fix" the condition and my approach of not directly addressing the issue but providing the perifpherals, a right environment so the dog gets a big head start has worked wonderfully for me.  I can proudly say I "cured" Marvin's true SA and he transitioned beautifully into his permanent home and I had him for 1 year and 5 months.  "tremendous amount of hard work".....search "Marvin" on this site and see the work that I have done with him.  Sampson, GD mix had the OC of drinking excess water and having to pee big time and often.  I did not address the issue by controlling the amount of water he drank because IMO that would have escalated his anxiety and he would have presented worse behavior.  My approach was to give him unlimited amounts of water, provide him a stable and structure environment, and build his confidence and trust....the human relationship.  Another example of anxiety within Anticipation and Excitement behavior not being a good combination.

As I have already said I am very glad that your way works for you and I applaud your efforts and respect your views. I would, and do, approach things differently. There is more than one road to success. I was not insinuating that you do not work hard, and apologize if you took it that way. As far as Sampson, I certainly would have treated that differently as there is a such thing as water poisoning and many health problems that can develop from an animal (or human) drinking constant and excessive amounts of water and I would have been unwilling to take that chance. Again, though, I am very happy that it worked out for you and that there were no ill effects to Sampson  I do not see how excessive water intake was linked to Anticipation and Excitement in that case? Could you explain please?