Saliva samples were obtained from each dog to assess how anxious they became from training. Additionally, the researchers observed the dogs’ behavior during training, looking for indicators that the dogs were feeling stress, e.g. yawing, lip-licking, paw-raising, and yelping. Predictably, the dogs in the aversive training groups displayed heightened anxiety behaviors, and their saliva, which researchers had obtained before and after their training sessions, had significantly elevated levels of cortisol compared to when they were chilling out at home. The pups who were trained with positive reinforcement were observably more relaxed, displaying fewer stress signals, and had lower cortisol levels in their saliva.
“Our results show that companion dogs trained using aversive-based methods experienced poorer welfare as compared to companion dogs trained using reward-based methods, at both the short- and the long-term level,” the researchers write in their paper. “Specifically, dogs attending schools using aversive-based methods displayed more stress-related behaviors and body postures during training, higher elevations in cortisol levels after training, and were more ‘pessimistic’ in a cognitive bias task.”
Number of occurrences of each stress-related behavior in the dogs averaged across the three training sessions for Group Reward (filled bars) and Group Aversive (empty bars).
Another interesting finding was that dogs that had received reward-based training were quicker to learn where the bowl’s location was as compared to dogs exposed to aversive-training methods. This could either suggest that the reward-based training had actually been more effective in training the dogs. Or it could just mean that dogs who had received treats as part of their reward training were already skilled in the task of finding treats.
Researchers also wanted to know the long-term effects of training stress. A month after the dogs had been assessed during their training, 79 dogs were then conditioned to associate a bowl on a certain side of a room with a sausage. If the bowl was on that particular side, it always held the savory snack. But if it was located on the other side of the room, the bowl never had the treat. (Each bowl was smothered in sausage so that the smell wouldn’t give the game away.) Next, researchers shifted the bowls around the room to random locations to see how quickly the dogs would come over in search of the sausage. If the dog scampered over to the bowl quickly, the researchers interpreted that to mean that he or she was expecting to find a delicious treat. Slower speeds indicated that the dog was more pessimistic about the bowl’s contents.
There Had to Be a Better Way!
Miss Sherrys yelling was very loud and non-productive, so one day, I decided to try something. I got some books from the library on child education and decided to try a method outlined in a book and was astounded by the results.
One day Miss Sherry was getting frustrated with a child who had a tantrum. The child didnt want to pick up the toys, so he just tossed them on the floor. Miss Sherry was ready to raise her big voice. It was then that I decided to step in.
I told Mrs. Sherry, “Watch this”….. I knelt down at the childs level and said, “Andrew, would you like to help Miss Adrienne pick up the blocks or the cars?”
Andrew looked at me inquisitively for a few seconds as if making a tough decision, and then with enthusiasm, he said, “Ill get the blocks, Miss Adrienne!”
“And Ill get the cars,” I said as we high-fived.
In less than a minute we were done! Amazing, the methods outlined from the book I read really worked!
By asking the question, the child was given a choice, versus being ordered to do something he disliked. Also, it turned out to be a game, so other children joined in and split the car-picking task with some picking up the blue cars, while others grabbed the red ones, and some others got the yellow ones.
From that day on, we used this method to help with clean-up and we also played music and enticed the kids to get it all done before the songs ended.
I think the fact I never raised my voice seemed to make a world of difference. When Miss Sherry was demanding things with her loud powerful voice, I tried to ask in a low, almost whispering tone, and used rewards to reinforce compliance and good choices.
Positive reinforcement can help potty-train your pup.
My use of rewards started as a way to speed up the childrens potty training. I must admit, I dreaded changing diapers. The little kids on two legs were peeing and pooping machines.
I had never changed a diaper before, so Miss Sherry was nice enough to take care of this the first few days so as not to gross me out.
While you would imagine a diaper would nicely contain messes, I soon discovered that diapers often werent enough. I have seen liquid poop seep right through a childs diaper and then on me when the child sat on my lap. Yuck! Phew! Gag!
I swear I was gagging a whole lot those first days and even the mere sight of chocolate pudding, which was often served after lunch, had me gagging, too, and the kids were laughing.
Actually, I even got seriously sick. I had to call off just a week after working there and was forced to stay at home with what seemed to be a mysterious case of the Coxsackie virus, which I later learned is caused by contact with surfaces contaminated with feces! Not surprising with those leaky diapers and children sitting everywhere and touching everything!
When I came back, it was time for me to change diapers. I soon learned to cope with the smell and control the whole gagging reflex by trying not to breathe. Sometimes, I would pass some Vicks Vapor rub on my nose to cover up.
While I picked up many dog poops when I worked for an animal hospital, nothing to me was as bad as changing a diaper. Luckily, I soon started getting a hang of it after a few months.
Yet, this whole diaper ordeal, the smell, and the diaper rashes are what ultimately motivated me to find a way to speed up potty training. So I soon discovered from a few books I lent from the library about the power of positive reinforcement training.
I soon learned how to recognize signs a child had to go potty. The child who became suddenly quiet and withdrew from play was a good candidate for a trip to the restroom. I swiftly took her to the potty right away and celebrated the successful potty event by giving out stickers or lollipops I carried in my pocket.
Soon, other children wanted stickers or lollipops too so they voluntarily wanted to sit on the toilet as well.
Well, who would have imagined? That year, we had almost 90 percent of the class potty trained by the end of April!
Today, I still use similar potty training techniques for puppies. The only difference is that I no longer carry lollipops, but bits of low-sodium hot dogs in my treat pouch!
Moral of the story? My whispering tone was an attention grabber and soon Miss Sherry tried her best to count before yelling and talk in a calmer voice too. Things started improving and the children seemed to pick up the good manners.
There were more “pleases” and “thank yous” at the table and fewer power struggles between Miss Sherry and the toddlers. But dont just take my word for this.
Research has proven this too. According to a study, a parents harsh verbal discipline was found to be damaging to a developing adolescent.
And of course, studies on dogs too show the negative effects of harsh training methods using intimidation. One study, in particular, proved that dogs enrolled in aversive training classes showed elevated stress behaviors and significantly increased levels of cortisol.
Another study showed that even indirect confrontation methods (techniques that use non-physical yet aversive and/or confrontational interactions to stop unwanted behaviors) such as yelling “no,” growling at the dog, saying “shh” elicited an aggressive response in dogs.
Not surprisingly, therefore, yelling at dogs is counterproductive. If you yell at your dog, you are likely to create defiance in the more resilient dogs and an overall inhibited/shut-down demeanor in the more sensitive ones.
Yelling at a barking dog will often only lead to confusion. Most likely, in this case, the dog assumes we are also agitated by whats going on outside of the house.
On top of that, since most people yell when a dog is barking, and fail to deliver praise when they catch their dog being quiet, the dog never gets to learn that silence is what we are really asking for.
Yelling at an adult dog for correcting a puppy may be a knee-jerk reaction for some owners, but even that can have negative repercussions considering that it risks creating more tension, with the adult associating being yelled at with the presence of the puppy, potentially leading to a more permanent dislike.
Negative repercussions are also seen when owners yell or use a threatening tone with their puppies when they have a pee or poop accident in the home. This triggers the behavior of puppies hiding to poop or pee and instills a general sense of mistrust.
Even mild punishments stress dogs out long term
Few things are more adorable—or destructive—than a new puppy. When they pee on rugs, chew furniture, and get aggressive with other pups, their stressed-out owners usually turn to dog training. Now, a novel study suggests programs that use even relatively mild punishments like yelling and leash-jerking can stress dogs out, making them more “pessimistic” than dogs that experience reward-based training.
“[Punishment] training may seem to work in the short run … but these methods can have future negative consequences,” says Marc Bekoff, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Colorado in Boulder who was not involved in the new study. “[These dogs are] living in perpetual stress.”
Previous studies have suggested that although both reward-based and punishment-based training methods are effective, punishment-based training can have negative effects. But those studies tend to focus on police and laboratory dogs instead of family pets, and most used shock collars, which have been banned in several countries, as punishment.
To find out how companion dogs react to more routine punishments, scientists led by Ana Catarina Vieira de Castro at the University of Porto in Portugal recruited 42 dogs from reward-based training schools, which use food or play to encourage good behaviors. The team also enlisted 50 dogs from aversive-based programs, which use negative reinforcement like yelling and leash jerking to train dogs, or even pressuring their rumps to get them to sit.
The researchers videotaped the dogs during training and tested their saliva before and after for the stress hormone cortisol. Dogs in the negative reinforcement programs showed more stress-related behaviors during training, such as lip licking and yawning, and they had higher levels of cortisol in their saliva than when at home, the team reports on the preprint server bioRxiv. Dogs in the reward-based training group showed no changes in cortisol levels during training or at home.
To find out whether these effects lingered, the researchers measured how 79 of the dogs responded to a potential food reward. First, they trained the dogs to associate one side of a room with a delicious sausage. If a dog found a bowl in that part of the room, it would contain sausage. But bowls on the other side of the room would be empty.
Then, the researchers placed an empty bowl at various positions between the two extremes and measured how quickly the dogs approached it. An “optimistic” dog would run excitedly to a bowl in the middle, whereas a “pessimistic” dog would move more slowly. (In humans, an equivalent might be a glass half empty versus glass half full mindset.) Such “pessimistic” mindsets have been associated with separation anxiety and other problem behaviors in dogs. In the test, the more punishment a dog had received, the more “pessimistic” it was, and the more pronounced the results.
“This was a careful study,” Bekoff says. And although the paper does not address which method is more effective at training dogs, Bekoff says this and other findings provide more than enough evidence that dog owners should avoid aversive-based training.
Thats often easier said than done, because many dog training schools dont advertise their methods, and such training is not regulated—at least in the United States, says Zazie Todd, a dog trainer and animal psychology blogger. She adds that dog owners should look explicitly for keywords like “reward-based,” and avoid schools that use language like “balance training” or “dominance methods.”
Bekoff agrees and says owners should take the time to talk to the trainer and to other owners who have worked with them. “[Reward-based training] may take time, but so what? At least the dog isnt living in fear or constant stress.”
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Stop Yelling At Your Dog Dog Training Myth Positive Methods Dog Training
A heartbreaking new study finds that screaming at dogs scares them for the long term — and patience is a far superior method for training them, Science Alert reports.
Researchers, led by biologist Ana Catarina Vieira de Castro of the Universidade do Porto in Portugal, recruited 42 dogs from schools that used reward-based training, and 50 dogs from aversion training schools.
During the study period, pups taught with yelling and leash-jerking were found to be more stressed, with higher levels of cortisol found in their saliva.
“Our results show that companion dogs trained using aversive-based methods experienced poorer welfare as compared to companion dogs trained using reward-based methods, at both the short- and the long-term level,” the researchers write in the paper published by biology news service bioRxiv.
“Specifically, dogs attending schools using aversive-based methods displayed more stress-related behaviors and body postures during training, higher elevations in cortisol levels after training, and were more ‘pessimistic’ in a cognitive bias task,” researchers found.
Pups that experienced calm, gentle teachers, however, performed better at tasks that researchers assigned to them, such as locating a bowl with sausage in it — in a roomful of empty but sausage-smeared bowls.
More harshly trained canines were slower to locate the treat bowl, which authors interpreted as showing that their experiences had made them more depressed, less hopeful hounds.
The biologists also analyzed dogs during training to look for “stress behaviors” such as lip-licking, paw-raising, yawning and yelping.
“Critically, our study points to the fact that the welfare of companion dogs trained with aversive-based methods appears to be at risk,” the researchers conclude.