Many dog owners train their dogs until they seem to “get it” and think they are done. Dog trainer Eric Brad suggests that there are other aspects to consider when training your dog, as are proximity, distraction, repetition and flexibility in how and where you train.
Training your dog is something everyone does. At least it’s something every dog owner does. But there is a remarkable range in what owners think “training” is and when a behaviour is “trained” to their satisfaction. Many times the trainer is just looking for that moment when the dog “gets it” and understands what is expected for a given behaviour. But it isn’t really that simple.
I have heard dog trainers that I respect say that anyone who thinks they have finished training a behaviour just doesn’t understand dog training. We can’t take it on faith that once a dog demonstrates an understanding of a behaviour we teach them, they then “know what we mean” and can perform it anytime, anywhere, and under any conditions.
You see, dogs are very literal creatures. When they learn something they take it all in and assume everything must be in it’s place in order to perform. When I taught my puppy to sit in our back bedroom in front of the couch, she learned that “sit” meant put your butt on the floor in the back bedroom in front of the couch. If I said “sit” in the kitchen, she though I must be crazy! I mean, we weren’t even IN the back bedroom and there WAS no couch. Silly dad!
Breaking Down the Breakdown
Experienced dog trainers know that teaching a behaviour is an ongoing process. Starting from our dog’s biology, their brains are just wired different from ours. The canine cerebral cortex (the part of the brain that stores patterns) takes up a much smaller percentage of their overall brain than it does in the human brain. They’re just not as good at making larger complex patterns into routine, easy to recall chunks. In short, they have to think about stuff more than we do.
Then there is the business of their literal nature. In learning a new behaviour, it seems our dogs believe that everything may be relevant. Their environment, our position, what we do with our hands and our body, and our voice may all be part of what we are asking. And so they take it all in. We have to help them understand what bits are important and which aren’t. And the best way we can do that is by breaking down the components in our own minds and rewarding them for variations that help them understand that they are to perform the behaviour in different situations and under different circumstances.
The 4 D’s of Good Training
An easy way to think about working with your dog to broaden their understanding of a given command is to think in terms of the “4 D’s of Dog Training” – Distance, Distraction, Duration, and Diversity. If the first step in teaching our dog a new behaviour is teaching them what we want them to do, then our next steps should be to show them where, how, and under what circumstances we need them to do it. Let’s look at each of these separately.
Distance – Some behaviours will require that our dog perform them even if we are away from them, not standing right near them. An example of this might be the “Stay” command. We ask our dog to stay where they are as we move away. But how far away? How long should they stay there? What is their signal that it’s not ok for them to follow? All of these things need to be taught. Like the foundation of a strong building, it should be built up in increments, bit by bit. We begin by taking one step away and rewarding, then two steps, then 4 steps, and so on. If our dog is successful as we work with them, we can build up to any distance we require given enough time and training.
Distraction – This one may be a little trickier that it first appears. Sure, movement and activity will be distracting to our dog. Sounds can be equally distracting. But what about more subtle distractions? The presence of favorite toys or another dog can be a huge distraction for our dogs. Certainly the presence and smell of food can be a distraction. And speaking of smells, new environments like your local park that are rich with very interesting smells can be very distracting, to say nothing of those delicate scents that may be carried on the breeze.
In order to get our dogs to perform trained behaviours in the presence of distractions, it’s best to introduce them only one at a time. It’s also best to start with things that are only mildly distracting and work your way up to more distracting things. You wouldn’t teach a behaviour in a quiet room at home and then expect it at the park in the presence of 3 dogs chasing balls. No one knows your dog better than you do so you will be the best judge of what is more or less distracting. Just remember to build up slowly or it all breaks down.
Duration – Some behaviours we teach are momentary and others need to be done for a longer time or for more repetitions. A nose touch to my hand is momentary, Once touched, the behaviour is over. But something like a “stay” or “backup” may require the dog to continue the behaviour until signalled to stop. For these behaviours we have to set our expectations appropriately. Just like building our foundation of performance in the face of distraction, we need to build up our dog’s ability to perform a behaviour for longer and longer durations.
Diversity – By “diversity” I really mean different combinations of the other 3 D’s plus some intangibles for different places or different people asking for the behaviour. A person’s history with a dog will play a role in how they respond to trained behaviours as will particular situations (e.g., you may have practiced at a particular park but not while a bicycle race was going on). This is the D that requires the most creativity and some discretion to use to your benefit. I train for Diversity as opportunities present themselves. Yes, I do have to be careful to manage and not increase my requirements in the other 3 D’s too much but sometimes a life situation is just to obvious to resist testing out a behaviour under some new conditions.
Adding and Subtracting
Working through the 4 D’s can be a little tricky. We have to think of it as an overall balance. As we increase the difficulty of, say, Distraction, we may want to decrease the requirements of Duration or Distance to help our dog succeed. One way to think of this is by assigning a number to your dog for each behaviour.
For example, if my “sit” behaviour is newly trained and not tested very much outside of my training room, my Diversity would be at level 1. Similarly, I have to stay fairly close and she won’t stay still for long so Distance and Duration are also at level 1. Since she can also tolerate very little Distraction at this point so she is also level 1 there. Overall my dog is a 4. If I wanted to increase her Distraction level to 2, I may temporarily reduce her Duration even further to Level 0, just a quick bum touch on the floor.
By managing my dog’s overall behaviour score, I can slowly increase it over time by carefully adding and subtracting difficulty across my 4 D categories. My dog may have “down” at an overall score of 10 – Distraction 3, Duration 3, Distance 2, and Diversity 2. I could attempt to improve her Distance to 3 and I may or may not need to lower my requirements in any of the other areas. If I can get that improvement without lowering my requirements, my dog is would then have an overall score of 11 for “down.”
Easier Than It Looks
This is just one way to look at how to manage the detailed training of behaviour and it may sound complicated. I promise you, it isn’t. The point is that it is important not to overlook the details when training our dogs. There will always be a new distraction or a new place that may throw our dog off-balance. And that’s where we have to be good trainers.
It’s tempting in those situations where we ask for a trained behaviour – and don’t get it – to think the dog is just being stubborn or willful and refusing to perform. Instead, it could be that this new situation or distraction means that we need to lower our requirements temporarily and reward for a more basic version of the behaviour until we can build it back up.
So when are we finished training a behaviour with our dog? I guess the short answer is “never.” There will always be a new situation or new requirement that we can work on to refine things a little bit more. And our dogs’ brains aren’t as big as ours so they can be forgiven for forgetting from time to time. So I believe those respected animal trainers when they say that training is an ongoing process, that it might not ever be “finished.” And that’s ok with me. I enjoy working with my dogs and they enjoy working with me. Training is just another activity where we can laugh and play together.
Until next time, have fun with your dogs!
Photo Credits
Sit – lipbomb 2008 from Flickr
Distracted – stephaniezens 2010 from Flickr
Working on Distance – Cryrolfe 2008 from Flickr
Out and About – NathanReed 2007 from Flickr
That was a very well explained process, Eric. Nice to have a clear article to direct people to.