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Do you believe in dog? 2016

Showing posts with label training. Show all posts
Showing posts with label training. Show all posts

14 June 2018

Not one way to do it. The ‘Do You Believe in Dog’ learning & training roundup #Train4Rewards

Not one way to do it. The ‘Do You Believe in Dog’ learning & training roundup #Train4Rewards

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Hey dog lover! What’s hidden behind most everything?

Why, it’s learning and training! 

While this probably sounds like a grand overstatement, it really isn’t. Here at Do You Believe in Dog, we’ve seen learning and training sneak into practically every nook and cranny of our relationship with dogs. But not all learning (or training) is the same.

Today, we’re participating in Companion Animal Psychology’s #Train4Rewards blog party 2018 by highlighting DYBID posts which taught us about reward-based training, often with the help of an excellent video! While we (Julie and Mia) write many of the posts here at DYBID, other canine science researchers have contributed to share their own research and findings. The posts below are relevant to all dogs and also explore where a dog lover can access good information on learning and training.
Check out the entire 2018 #Train4Rewards Blog Party

Dog training: Do you get the timing right?
What a difference a second can make! Clare Browne discusses her research on the effect of a 0 or 1 second reinforcement delay. [VIDEO INCLUDED]

Diabetic alert dogs: Seeking solutions with sniffing canines and science
Cat Reeve shares her work with diabetic alert dogs (DADs). How do dogs learn to alert when a person has a hypoglycemic event (low blood sugar)? What samples should we use to teach them? [VIDEO INCLUDED]

Copy dogs?
Claudia Fugazza reminds us that reward-based training can, and should, get social. Claudia explains how dogs can learn new behaviors by observing and copying their handler. Dogs are the new copycats. [VIDEO INCLUDED]

How to make fireworks less upsetting for dogs
When something scary comes along, there’s something you should know. We can help our dogs. Veterinarian Sophia Yin shows us how. [VIDEO INCLUDED]

51 Shades of Grey: Misuse, misunderstanding and misinformation of the concepts of “dominance” and “punishment”
Simon Gadbois looks at science as a method of inquiry, and explores its purpose and applications in the real world.

The science of carrots and sticks
Mia reflects on a training day the the Melbourne Aquarium and highlights a great book by McGreevy and Boakes called ‘Carrots and Sticks: Principles of Animal Training.’

Dog-eared books
Guess what? Our recommended book list from 2013 is still relevant today! 

Be sure to check out other posts participating in the Train for Rewards Blog Party 2018.

Julie Hecht & Mia Cobb
Do You Believe in Dog Facebook & Twitter

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15 January 2015

2015: Puppy New Year! Get some science into your dog

2015: Puppy New Year! Get some science into your dog

2015 is a bright and shiny new year for canine science! 

But first, this face:

After being a dog-less household for eight months (you might remember we sadly farewelled Elke in 2013 and gut-wrenchingly, also old man Caleb, in the first half of 2014) we welcomed a new member to the family at the end of 2014. 

Those paws. Not photoshopped.
If I'm honest with you, I'd been stalking PetRescue quietly for a month or so, not really sure if the time was right, but also open to being inspired to make it the right time to welcome a new dog into our lives. I eventually made a call to a shelter a long, long way away about a dog I'd seen who looked like the kind of dog I thought would be a good fit for our family over the next fifteen years. His profile had been up for a few weeks and I was concerned he might be nearly out of time to be adopted. The lovely shelter staff let me know he'd actually just been adopted that morning - I was thrilled for him and his new family. Probably a good thing anyway, that shelter was 5 hours' drive away - no small distance. 

 The following day I received a message from the shelter staff - there was another dog - a younger pup, similar type, would I be interested? "Send me some photos and a video clip of him" I said... and they did. I told Julie about the pup and how far away he was. "Love this story!! Keep it coming ;)" she said via email. Huh, I thought - what an adventure this could be to meet a new family member - and luckily, my partner agreed!

So a week later, coincidentally on my birthday, we headed off after lunch on a 400km (that's 250miles to those of you who prefer miles) drive to a faraway coastal town south west of Melbourne to meet this four month old pup. He had come into the regional shelter as a stray. Whether he was deliberately dumped, wandered off through an open gate, or actively strayed by jumping a fence - we'll never know. That's part of the shelter dog story - not necessarily knowing what came before. 

What we do know is this: 
  • He was not identified by microchip, had no collar with ID and was not desexed
  • No one came looking for him during his two weeks in the shelter
  • On meeting us, he was excitable, mouthy and jumpy, but calmed down fairly quickly
  • We have named him Rudy (roo-dee), inspired by Rudolph as it was Christmas week


What is he?
We've been asked that a lot! Rudy is a Staghound. Staghounds in Australia are similar to Lurchers and Longdogs in the UK - a 'type' of dog, rather than a breed. Staghounds are generally greyhound x deerhound with maybe a bit of whatever else was around the area in them too. They can vary widely in looks as they are bred with an emphasis on health, performance and longevity, rather than to a physical standard. They are generally bred to help with hunting in rural areas, but like greyhounds, can make excellent companions as well. As you'd expect, they are highly distracted by moving things.

A diet of science
Inevitably, we're feeding Rudy a daily dose of science. If you want to keep up with how he's going, you can follow the #RaisingRudy hashtag on Twitter, keep up with our Do you Believe in Dog? Facebook posts, or check in here at the blog for regular updates. I've never claimed to be a dog trainer, but I'm certainly aware of the importance of putting the wide array of scientific findings into practice with our dogs to help them have a great life and help us enjoy our time with them.

 So far, over the first couple of weeks Rudy's been with us, this has looked a bit like this:
In these early days, we're focusing on socialisation (new experiences, places, people, surfaces, sounds, smells), basic training (toilet training, recall, sit, leash walking, house behaviour, independent time outside) and getting to know Rudy (learning how he responds to new places, loud noises, other dogs and people, etc.). We're marvelling at those ears. 

 We're remembering what having a puppy in the house means (e.g. encouraging the puppy to splash its feet in a toddler pool is super funny and cute, until it starts repeating that behaviour in the indoor water bowl and floods your laundry!). We're a tidier household for it (Shoes go in cupboards! Pre-schooler's toys get put away! Remote controls go up high!).

 If, like us, it's been a while since you raised a puppy, you might enjoy the back seat experience (sometimes hilarious, sometimes frustrating!) offered by the new BBC documentary series 'Six Puppies and Us' - Episode 1 linked here:
What science have you fed your dog recently? 
What should I be sure to feed mine? 

 Let us know your thoughts by commenting on the blog, Facebook or Twitter - and join in #RaisingRudy.

 Til next time, 

 Mia

 p.s. No, this hasn't turned into just a puppy blog! The Do You Believe in Dog? team will still be bringing you regular guest posts from fellow canine scientists, monthly updates on the science that's caught our attention and news on major events we attend in 2015.

 Further reading:
Kidd A.H. & Kidd, R.M. (1989). Factors in Adults' Attitudes Toward Pets, Psychological Reports, 65 (3) 903-910. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.2466/pr0.1989.65.3.903 

 Hiby E.F., Rooney N.J. & Bradshaw J.W.S. (2004). Dog training methods: their use, effectiveness and interaction with behaviour and welfare. , Animal Welfare, 13 (1) 63-70. 

© Mia Cobb | Do You Believe in Dog? 2015
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27 March 2014

Do As I Do: Copy Cat Social Imitation in Dog Training

Do As I Do: Copy Cat Social Imitation in Dog Training

Join us for another guest post, this time from Claudia Fugazza of the Family Dog Project in Budapest. Claudia's here to discuss her recent publication in Applied Animal Behaviour Science on the efficiency of new methods in dog training.

Hi Mia and Julie,

Formal training methods used until now rely mainly on the well-known rules of individual associative learning. These methods work perfectly well for a very wide range of animals — pigeons, rats, dogs and even crabs — and human and non-human animals can learn by ‘click and treat,’ as noted in the popular training book by Karen Pryor.

However, recent research has found substantial evidence that dogs could be predisposed to acquire information socially via the ‘Do as I do’ method. Do as I Do is a relatively new training method for people to use, based on dogs’ social cognitive skills, particularly on their imitative ability. 
With this training technique, dogs learn new behaviors by observing and copying their handler. The dog is a copycat. This method relies on social learning, and it was recently introduced in the applied field of dog training. 




As this method has started spreading in the dog training world, we felt that its efficiency and efficacy needed scientific testing. We were also wanting to know whether this method would be more or less efficient than other current training methods in training for particular behaviors.

We expected that dogs would more easily copy object-related actions from a human demonstrator so we tested dogs’ efficiency in this kind of tasks. To do this, I travelled across Italy and the UK with my video-cameras as well as a heavy Ikea cabinet filled with objects (you can imagine the weird looks I got from security personal at checkpoints!). I used these objects to test dogs learning to open or close drawers and lockers, pick up items from it etc. Since training methods can be affected by the skills of the trainer, only experienced dog-owners pairs who achieved a certificate either for the ‘Do as I do’ method or for shaping / clicker training were included in the study. Each pair was tested using ‘his’ method for teaching three different object-related actions in three testing sessions.


 We expected that the ‘Do as I do’ method would prove more efficient for teaching complex tasks, compared to the shaping method that relies on individual learning. This expectation comes from what we know in humans: we tend to rely more on social learning when required to learn something difficult.

Our research found that the ‘Do as I do’ method proved more efficient for teaching dogs complex tasks, like close a drawer, open a locker and pick up an item that was inside (i.e., the time needed by the owner to obtain the first correct performance of the predetermined action was shorter with the ‘Do as I do’ method compared to shaping). We did not find a significant difference in the efficiency of the methods for teaching dogs simple tasks like knocking over a bottle or ringing a bell.

Now that we know a bit more on how to efficiently teach complex object-related actions, we are curious to know what happens when we want to teach different kind of complex actions, like body movements. We also want to know whether introducing social learning in dog training could have an effect on learning cues for trained action. 

We are aware that learning rates can be influenced by many factors, and we acknowledge that this study is just a very first step towards a more scientific approach to training paradigms. However we believe that this kind of information can be very important for the practitioners working in the applied field of dog training. We hope that the readers will not misinterpret the results and will not extend them to different actions and situations that were not tested.

Furthermore we would like to emphasize that, despite being efficient for training some kinds of actions, the ‘Do as I do’ method does not replace the methods based on individual learning (for example think of how many actions are not imitable at all if the demonstrator is a human and the learner is a dog!). Instead ‘Do as I do’ is a useful (and fun!) addition to existing training paradigms. Experienced dog trainers may find effective ways to mix the different training techniques in order to obtain the best results with each dog. 

Claudia Fugazza
Do as I Do Book and DVD
http://www.apprendimentosociale.it/en/claudia-fugazza/
Family Dog Project 

 Reference 
Fugazza C. & Miklósi Á. (2014). Should old dog trainers learn new tricks? The efficiency of the Do as I do method and shaping/clicker training method to train dogs, Applied Animal Behaviour Science, 153 53-61. DOI:

© Do You Believe in Dog? 2014
 p.s. Check out this dog's excellent jump!



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13 October 2013

Working Dog Conference: bridging the gap between science and industry

Working Dog Conference: bridging the gap between science and industry

(source)
Hi Julie,
how great was Dr Brad Smith's guest post to us about his research investigating dingo cognition? Responsiveness to humans, tool use and conspecific reaction to death - just all kinds of awesome! 

I'm so glad the editors at Science Seeker noticed it and flagged it to their followers, because this kind of stuff should be known by EVERYONE. 

I mean, TOOL USE BY A WILD DOG, HELLLLLLLLLLLOOOOO! This is a big deal.

(Science Seeker)

Reading about new areas of scientific research that advance our understanding of canids, how we relate to them - and them to us, and each - other always gives me a buzz! It's a good thing, because I'm so flat out right now, I need to harness all the buzzes around me to stay awake and productive! 


We're just three weeks out from the Working Dog Conference 2013 now and let me tell you, it is seriously shaping up to be one amazing event for anyone related to working and sporting dogs in any way. Breeders, trainers, handlers, facility managers, geneticists, veterinarians, representatives from government and animal advocacy groups, research scientists and pretty much anyone and everyone with an interest in this industry seem to planning on attending. It's exciting and insanely busy - all at once! 

I can't wait to see the opportunities to network, share ideas and learn in action and the concept of improvement through collaboration being embraced by all these different stakeholders. I think Victor Hugo has been credited with once saying something along the lines of "there is nothing as powerful as an idea whose time has come" and this really feels like the time for this idea!


Let me give you a sneaky preview of some of the things our international guest speakers have been saying:

"The rest of the world doesn’t know it yet, but because of the Australian Working Dog Alliance’s efforts, Australia stands ready to set the new standard for working dog welfare and effectiveness. There will come a day when we who attend this inaugural Working Dog Alliance conference will have the distinct privilege of being able to say, ‘I was there when it all started.’  I am humbled to be a small part of what will surely be a big thing." Steve White

 
"There is obvious and substantial  value to be gained by sharing knowledge and expertise surrounding their training, welfare  and use. However, I believe that it is vital that  such knowledge is evidence-based, to ensure  we derive proven best practises which truly optimise productivity as well as dog welfare. This inaugural conference will provide an ideal forum for discussion amongst the Australian working dog stakeholders  and I am delighted to be able to share some of my ideas and research findings with the working and sporting dog community." Nicola Rooney

Oh Julie, I really wish you could come and be here for this. Actually, it's not too late - you can still register here (winkwink!)

It's going to be our kind of event, mixing up the applied practical stuff with the theoretical scientific stuff - and all the other stuffs too! Hey, speaking of our kind of event, I was pretty excited last week when I saw the website for Canine Science Forum 2014 and the associated Facebook page (including first Feline Science Forum - tell Josh!) have launched. That's going to be one kicking reunion for us, milady! Start thinking about which abstracts you're going to submit by March 14th...

(image thanks to AWDRI)

Ahhhh - abstracts, I think I can actually hear them calling me. I'm currently compiling all the presentation summaries for the Working Dog Conference ahead of sending the proceedings book off to the printers tomorrow. 

Here are just a few (amongst many!) of the snapshot summaries I am really looking forward to see presented:
  • Presentation about breaking down the inter-disciplinary barriers that have for too been a drag on the working dog community's progress toward maximizing effectiveness, efficiency, and the dogs' well-being.
  • Every year thousands of greyhounds are bred in Australia for one thing only: speed, with the ongoing challenge being how to care for those that are not fast enough. Re-homing programs are a commendable initiative, however the current approach is plagued with inefficiencies, prolonged waiting times and often put the needs of the dog ahead of the adopter, making it a public safety issue as well.
  • Australia has a long and successful history of producing champion (human) athletes. In this presentation the scientific and research support for Australian sport will be explored and parallels drawn with the working dog industry.
  • Otway Conservation Dogs is a unique conservation project developing detection dog teams utilising community volunteers to help protect the endangered Tiger Quolls. 

If you want to get more of an idea, the preliminary program is now up on the Working Dog Alliance website.

What have you been up to lately, anyway?

Mia

© 2013 Mia Cobb | Do You Believe in Dog?

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