Training Without Conflict® 에피소드 2: 게스트 Dr. Mark Plonksy와 함께하는 Ivan Balabanov

the article that I wrote on the purely positive approach. Um but I also wrote an article at that time on classical conditioning and how that relates to dog training. And I think that's an area where you know, dog trainers have spent an enormous amount of time at this point on operant conditioning, reinforcement contingencies, ad nauseam, etc., etc., etc. And I'm not criticizing that, that's a great thing. I think for many trainers that understanding of operant conditioning has helped enormously. But let I think that as a researcher one of the things that I particularly studied in studying animal learning, how people and animals learn, you know, I ran rats through mazes for like 25 years. That's a lot of rats going through them mazes. One of the things I particularly studied was the mechanisms and theories to help us understand classical conditioning, that guy Pavlov with the drooling dogs and all that stuff. For for some reason it's still like there was this huge boom in the early '90s about the operant conditioning and the shaping and and somehow it's still That's why I see it as being um so contagious, so successful in getting spread through the dog training community. Where classical conditioning is kind of more subtle, it's more of an undertone. Uh but nonetheless, I see it as the two go hand in hand. Um in fact, some folks would argue, although this is probably getting off field, that classical and operant conditioning they're really one thing, they're not even different. It's just two different ways of looking at the same thing. Yeah, cuz eventually they start to overlap, but I would be interested to hear a little bit and I'm sure the the audience will be interesting to to hear a little bit about that if you want to go a little bit on that. Well, the way the way I wrote this article and it's posted on the web, I tried to orient it towards your average person could read it rather than a college student or professor. and uh I talked about how with classical conditioning three things are learned. Um you know, in operant conditioning the animal learns what do I need to do to get something good or avoid something bad? Or on the other hand, if you want to get more complex, what do I need not to do to get something good or avoid something bad? Which is the less talked part of it. With classical conditioning, classical conditioning is concerned primarily, first and foremost, with what predicts what. Yeah, it's all anticipation of I know what comes next. You know now I have my school for dog trainers and I do cover I mean we talk about operant and classical and I teach both very extensively. Ultimately, I really try to explain much

more the classical part because when we train dogs, we're we're giving the dogs commands. And even if you start with shaping, even if you switch whichever way you're going to start, eventually, you're telling the dog what to do. You're queuing the dog what to do, which becomes classical event, no matter what. And if you don't understand how classical conditioning works and what are the components and what are the big mistakes that you you just really completely ruin it because it's about prediction, right? So, as long as the dog can predict somewhere else what comes next instead of what you want him to predict it from, you just blew your training session and and much more than that, right? I think the important thing with classical conditioning, the the first important thing is what predicts what. But the second thing, which um operant conditioning ignores emotions. Operant conditioning doesn't even want you to talk about emotions. But classical conditioning is first and foremost, that's cuz an event is important to learn about if it's emotional. And so we got to be careful with the emotions because if we do something and it makes that animal think that something really bad's going to happen, the animal is not going to like this. It's not going to be a pleasant emotion. I mean, emotions dictate level of motivation and what kind of motivation depending on what kind of emotion is involved. So we were talking about those emotions. And um if the particular you know, like Pavlov talked about a tone predicting food. So when a tone tells the dog that food's going to happen, that yes, something is going to happen and it's a pleasant thing. One could argue that the dog was feeling joy. It was happy that that it was being told you're going to get food. Now if I'm telling you that something bad's going to happen, you're not feeling so good. You're feeling distress. If I'm telling you that something good that you were expecting to happen is not going to happen, you're probably feeling disappointment. And I want to make clear that I'm arguing that people and the dog both have these emotions. We both show classical conditioning. Last but not least, to round out the quadrant, if I'm telling you that something bad is not going to happen, you're like phew, you're feeling relief. So I think it's important that dog trainers kind of get the hang of that some of the cues, you know, that if what they do and then they let's say shock an animal, that if that cue predicts shock, the animal's not feeling good about that. And I'm not saying the animal should always feel good, but what I am saying is that the trainer should have a bit of a handle on

what they're doing and what kind of emotions it's going to create in that dog. I I'm so so much with you on this because uh in in a big part I think it's to blame the the whole operant like the shaping of with by approximation kind of style of training cuz it's just focuses so much strictly on creating a behavior that the trainers forget about that there is actual living being with emotions in front of them and they're just chasing that behavior after behavior after behavior, not understanding that if you tap in the right emotions, that dog's going to want to do it so much better and so much more um with that the joy as as you're saying it in there. I I never got to talk about this one thing that I'm kind of leading up to that Remember I said the animal learns three things in classical conditioning. One of them is what predicts what. And then I showed you how or we just discussed how emotions are learned because emotions are involved when we're talking about biologically relevant stimuli. But the third thing is is really interesting and that's that the animal comes to treat the predicting stimulus as if it was the biologically relevant stimulus. So with Pavlov, he rang a tone and he followed it with food. Eventually the animal salivated to the food. You know, so what does this got to do with dog training? How could I as a dog trainer use the fact that the animal begins to treat the predicting stimulus as if it was the biologically relevant stimulus. And what comes to mind is a um particular psychologist, uh let's see if I get her name here, uh Dr. Pamela Reid. Uh she's up in Canada, I believe, and I was attending one of her conferences one of her um seminars many years ago. And somebody in the audience asked how uh they they wanted to get the dog to do retrieves, but they didn't want to use force at all. And the dog had no inclination to do the retrieve. And so Dr. Reid replied that basically you could use this fact that in classical conditioning the animal begins to treat the stimulus as if it was the biologically relevant stimulus. So, let's make long story short here. How we going to get this animal to retrieve using classical conditioning? person wanted the dog to retrieve a dumbbell for competition. And so what Allison Reid said was that if the dumbbell predicts food, then the animal would begin to treat the dumbbell as if it was food. It would try to eat it. If it tries to eat the dumbbell, that's the beginning of a retrieve, and then we could begin to use operant conditioning to reward those behaviors. So, what she did then was to tell the person to put the dog in a crate and to cut a little hole in the crate so

that a dumbbell could be lowered into the crate using a pulley system. And so then what happens is you lower the dumbbell into the crate and then give the dog a food pellet. You do this a bunch of times. Eventually, the dog goes in bites the dumbbell. At which point you say, "Good dog." and reward that behavior. So, this is an example of how you could use uh classical conditioning to help uh teach a uh a dumbbell retrieve. Yeah, that would have been cool to have a video of that, no? Well, that and I I would love to have had a video of that and I don't, but I do have a video that will help illustrate this concept and that was done by a another Reed, but not not uh not Pamela Reed. This was done by a professor like myself, Dr. Alistair Reed, and he was teaching his had his students, like I've often done, train rats to press the bar. But, what he did was train the rats to play basketball. The objective here in rat basketball is to gain a better understanding of how to shape the rats or shape your subjects into doing a certain behavior. Once they get um the ball into the basket, they'll get a reward in here and that'll be their reward to reinforce the score. So, notice the rat drops it into the basket and gets a pellet. But, notice how much difficulty the rat has in letting go of the basketball. If the rat is treating that basketball as if it's food, it can't let it go. It can't stop wanting to chew it because that basketball comes to predict that food and so it's treated as if it was the food. And so, classical conditioning explains why these rats are having a really difficult time I love it. letting go of those basketballs. That's your actually the um What was their names? Keller and and Marian Breland, right? The the instinctual drift. They did it they did that with the raccoon. That's one of the biggest Well, I wouldn't say the biggest, but one of the the main components of the time discoveries where operant conditioning and specifically Skinnerian form of reinforcement started to kind of get shaken. Because up to that point everybody thought that oh, we just reinforce and there is no way we we're going to make it happen. And without considering that genetic predisposition, what just happened there. It that that was a that was a wake-up call and and actually in in you know, I mean then then you have the few few more kind of really big cool studies that happened after and before that pointed out that reinforcement is not one for everything and it just as long as we reinforce and we suppress, things will happen or not happen. That was the the original theory if if I'm not wrong. And I remember I I actually teach this in my class about

John Garcia. He tried to publish that was in the '60s. He tried to publish this and they were not letting him publish it for years because it just will crumble the whole system of reinforcement. Mind-blowing. And what what really happens even today, people still believe that um um you know, you can be all you can be as long as you do the right things and you get reinforced and you get like completely disregarding your genetic makeup. Especially like for for dog trainers, so important to to recognize and appreciate for for anybody that spends enough time over the research that's been done that claims that positive reinforcement is the solution for everything and it's just better than anything which is the old Skinnerian concept. I think it's created a lot of problems. I mean a good example is these days the dog pulls. People put a harness on the dog. A harness to stop pulling. I don't know what planet they're living on but what I put a harness on the dog when I want it to pull. So putting a harness on the dog to stop pulling doesn't work. I mean it keeps me in business and it enables my canine consulting service to flourish but I don't think it's helping people. And my impression is they do that because it's viewed as positive and gentle and force free. I'd be all for it if it worked. Problem is it don't work. The thing is like I tell you what like from from a competitive and you know I'm like super competitive in dog sports like I if I know that something works better than anything else. I I would travel if I need to go to Mars I I find a way to go to Mars to learn that skill. And that's not just me. That's that's probably 80% of the all the die hard dog trainers that go and compete. We are always in a search always in a quest to perfection and to find a better way. Everybody would love to have a dog that you don't need to use any aversive and be the best. When you go into all the studies that swear by positive reinforcement, you would see it's a very interesting phenomenon because like in let's say 10 years ago a study a paper comes out and they claim something. But they clearly say, well, it works or maybe doesn't, but more research is needed. And next thing you know, the next study that comes up cites that as a fact, as a reality. And fast forward 10 studies ahead now they are all have cited each other for the that the first one came up with. And for the average person that reads a study and sees all those Okay, well, oh, it's got to be true cuz I mean, look how many you know, it's confirmed 10 times in in various studies in the past. But if you take the time and you go back and you see they are all there is no base and they cannot be

replicated just as we were talking with John. It is frustrating because we as dog trainers we want to move forward. We want to find the best ways to train, the most effective and the most humane ways. But when such false information is thrown at us it confuses things. And fortunately, there is always you know, you can you can make a survey with 10 dogs. You can make a little you know, paper and and do some research that you got funded by, you know, it's guaranteed that it's going to work just cuz you're using the right words and and the the idea fits the politically correct trend right now. So, yes, you're going to get published. But everybody, I bet you they also know that it doesn't work that way. Cuz if you spend enough time in science, you you must be I I I don't know. Like I don't know. I'll I'll listen to you cuz Well, I would say it's not just for dog trainers. I see this emphasis on purely positive to be part of the problem where my students towards the later part of my career, in my opinion, were typically not as good as the students in my earlier part of my career. Because student people these days, parents don't want to say no to their kids, just like trainers don't want to tell their dog, "No." I think it's a problem not just for dogs, but for society. Sometimes people and dogs need to be punished. I mean, I'm not saying it should be brutal. It should certainly be humane and appropriate principles that science has shown. For example, it needs to be prompt. It needs to be consistent. I mean, there are We've studied this enough to know what works and what doesn't. Yes. See, this is ethics. This is This is exactly my point. Like you Like this is what they have created. You You feel almost guilty when you say punished. You feel that you have to actually back up and and explain that it's not what you imagine because it's ingraded by now in everybody that this must be something horrific. And punishment is it's so valuable and it can happen and it happens in every day. It's just it's like the wind and the rain. I mean, you know, you turn the hot knob. Both you and I particularly like the use of negative punishment, which doesn't involve aversive events. We're taking away something good, and the animal learns from that. But, that needs a lot of explanation. Most people don't understand that right away. A lot of times, the argument of the force-free is that we know all the how they would bring all the side effects, the bad side effects of punishment. But, just as you're talking with your students, I'm sure, you know, they grew up like this at home, at school, at the university, they were always led to

believe that you can be all you can be, and you're the champion, and you're the champion, and and And next thing you know, they enter real life. And now they have a job, and and they're not the champion. And that must hit them very hard. Yes, indeed. I mean, it used to be early on in my teaching career, the first 10 20 years, when I gave a student a poor grade, they went home and studied harder, and realized that they messed up. In the later part of my career, when I gave a student a poor grade, they blamed me that I didn't do my job, or whatever. And that's the point with, you know, how one of the favorite top three things to point out about side effects of punishment is that it it creates the counterattack. It creates aggression. But, so does positive reinforcement. Once you learn to be, "Oh, you're the champion. You're the best, and you're whatever." And all of a sudden, you come to realizations that you are just an ordinary person, and you have to accept it, and you have to function through life, and get a real job, and actually prove that you are who you are. And you have two choices. You're going to get angry or you're going to start getting depressed. And neither one is good because all that positive upbringing didn't help you function in reality. But I would argue that averse of events are more prone to like when I when I bump my knee or stub my toe, I get angry. Um yeah, I might get angry if I don't get something that I was I was promised that was good, but the averse of events have a tendency to create a little more nasty aggression a little more quickly. Yeah, that that this would be I think you would agree with this um non-contingent versus contingent, right? Mhm. It always has a very very big role. And this is actually in fact part of what really pisses me off about the studies that come up because they will always bring some really beautiful easy cool example of how positive reinforcement will do magic and then bring the ugliest non-contingent punishment event that is just horrific thing that like why would you do it? Who who does it anyway? And if somebody does it, they should not. I mean, clearly should not, but Yes. But how can you use that as your example of comparison? That's just such a bad manipulation. Like in the article I wrote uh talking about purely positive, I talked about how even today in 2020 punishment is still used with humans in severe situations like children that are self-injuring and babies that let's see in that article I talked about a baby that if they didn't use punishment baby would have died. It was vomiting to the point where it was emaciated. It wasn't going to survive.

And they arranged contingent punishment for the stomach contractions. They hooked it up to a EKG uh um something to measure the muscle contractions. As soon as the muscle contract they gave a shock. And that was the thing that turned it around. The kid began eating and not kid went on to survive. But this is a case where humans in a medical setting use aversive stimuli electric shock or other such punishment. But you don't hear about that a lot. No, no you don't. Like like for sure like I I can argue with anybody that I can list more positive side effects of proper punishment than the negative. Like if you if we put the cost and benefits of of correct use I I don't see how somebody can argue. Well, but you you said a key word. The proper punishment, proper use. Like for example both you and I when we use punishment we always make an alternative behavior available that can be reinforced. That's a given. But many people don't. And I would call that inappropriate use of punishment. That's going to lead to more unpleasant side effects and less positive results than when an alternative appropriate behavior is made available that can be rewarded. No, I mean that there is so so many rules or or laws of of how how to and why to to how to how to apply punishment, you know? I mean, but this is the problem because I I I think at this point where we are in the dog training world, you know, we know we know in Europe it's all I mean I would say at this point the majority of the countries the the electric collars are banned and and certain a lot of things are banned in in the quest to to stop using aversives all together. But, what happens in reality I I think it's far more dangerous because you don't need to be scien- tific you know, uh a person that just digs into science. You you're born to understand that, you know, you approach something that attracts you and you avoid something that it's aversive. This is biological you know probably the most fundamental rule in our universe. And subconsciously we understand that. We don't need to really study it. It's like, "No, you you touch the hot stove and you back off and you're like, "All right, that was dumb." But, what happens when we have these studies and we decide pro- paganda that bans everything. I'm so against the banning, but once you start banning things that work people continue to use them but they hide. And when they hide, they don't get the right education. And they rush things. I they do dumb things. And actually I am I I witness it cuz I go places and I train dogs and I see people. You know, when when you are doing things behind doors and there is nobody to teach you and

nobody to to actually show you how to do things right. You're literally just doing stupid Because you have to hide. And you know, like I mean with everything. I'm sure you I don't know how you feel, but I'm like don't you don't ban things. Educate. Show show show if if you claim that something is better, it's very easy to show that it is. And if it is, guess what? We all going to line up. Like like we going to pay you money. Forget about your scientific paper. You're going to be rich because we all going to come at your door. Please give us a workshop and please teach us. No question, right? I think that's one of the biggest problems of the value judgment and ethics getting in the way of of the appropriate use of punishment is that people are afraid to talk about it. Or they don't want to talk about it because they think they shouldn't use it cuz it's bad. But when what bugs me though is when they say that science shows it doesn't work or that that it it works not as good or no. Science doesn't show It never says that. It's like the ridiculous cherry picking of three sentences and you make one that you want to be. I don't know. What do you Where do you think we're going? I mean, where where is this going to go? Like I I am hoping that eventually the world's going to people will be like, "Okay, let let's let's back up and let's start over. And let's rethink this and let's do it right. Humanity is just uh uh flawed, you know, like we this this will never happen most likely. I don't think that what you're describing No, I don't think it'll happen. But I am somewhat optimistic that I mean, people are going to continue to train dogs in ways it may not like the use of e-collars or whatever. They're going to continue to get used. I mean, the government the the um the military, they need their dogs. And so the dogs is still going to get trained. Um Yes, but your average Joe will have access to those kinds of tools or even the knowledge to use them. That may take quite a bit longer. Quite a few countries in Europe police and military, they also are not allowed to to use aversives. Yeah, by by law. I mean, they have to. We everybody knows that you have to. So you you're you know, in some ways you're becoming a little bit of a criminal because you're doing something against the law in order to do your job. I don't know. I think that the military kind of does is there in the United States. I I I don't think they're telling us the things they really do. You know what like um there's some interesting things in Europe, I tell you. I mean, there is a whole market for example right now that you can you buy all sorts of collars and things that you basically

can hide a training equipment. So nobody knows. That's even here in the United States. Prong collars, all kinds of covers and Right. styles that are less visible and And when you look at the the very first studies that they started, you know, the the one was in that Dutch study. I I it was 2003. And even in that study they just went so overboard. The dogs are afraid to walk in the park, afraid of their shadows, and and all sorts of just just like a crazy ideas. But the interesting part is that they suggest that they should breed dogs with less drive, dogs that are easier to manage. Because obviously you don't have a solution, so therefore let's change the makeup of the dog. And the other one in that same study, which is the the very first study that that um started that whole movement of banning training equipment, even there they admitted that especially like for predatory behavior problems, you know, like ships and chasing wild stock and car chasing use of aversive to suppress is essential. Even even they said it in their study, but that part is never said in the studies that came after. Mhm. And very interesting how again it's the cherry picking. After that there was the second big study that kind of basically really topped off everything and it was like, "Okay, now we ban everything." And I think that was um Schalke, was Germany, Hanover, and I think it's 206 or something, I don't know. So in this particular one they carefully right away tell you that those are beagles beagle dogs that are bred for study. They are like laboratory dogs, so they're not like, you know, this one lived in that home and this one live in that home. They're all genetically similar and they are brought up in the same environment. So, you know, that that makes sense, right? So, what they did, they taught everybody how to chase that prey. And then it's like, okay, now we're going to use electric shock to stop them. And there is group A, group B, and group C. And I don't know which of the groups, but let's say group A, what they did, they actually taught a recall and punished the dog if the dog didn't come. And to to leave the toy. On the group B, there was no recall, they would just punish the dog for to stop chasing. And group C, guess what they did. They basically shocked the dogs randomly. Like like pretty much flipping a coin, pop, flipping a coin, pop. Like completely non-contingent, right? The thinking behind this was that some people just don't know better and they will just do crazy Which it's very true. I know people that will do crazy stuff. That they're just not intelligent enough and or they don't care for the animal. I know there people like that. But

so far the the whole study looked pretty cool until that point that they used that group dog C where basically they were non-contingently shocked. as the reason why we should not use collars to where the the group A and group B, they actually proved to function and proved that even though they had stress in during the learning, they recovered and they were completely sound and perfectly fine to where group C poor things, they were afraid to walk into the room. And right fully so. But if you don't take the time and actually study and see how it goes and if you're the just the emotional I love dog people and you say, "Well, no. See, this is what happens. They don't want to even go into that room anymore. They're a nerve wreck." And they truly are. I'm surprised. Like, when was that study done in the 2006, you said? Yeah. Yeah. I don't think they could even do that study now because these days doing studies involving aversive events takes approval of committees and such. Used to be easy to get approval. Nowadays, very difficult to get approval. So, even to study that kind of thing has become harder to do. Yeah, in Europe, for some reason, I think it's just because of the the good cause, so to speak, they continue to do so. I mean, right now, um um right now in the UK it's a big war. Same goes in Holland, also, right now. But in the UK, it's a it's been for several years right now a big battle. You know, don't get me wrong. I mean, I I talk like this and I wish someday I can actually talk to these people because I would love to have a conversation with them. Because I listen to I listen. Researchers. Yes. Yes. Like like for example, there is a like in the UK, there is um Dr. Mills. There is There is a There's There are a few people. Mhm. I I've had dinner one time with Dan Mills at a conference and stuff. Nice guy. Um he's researcher though. Dan is not a dog trainer, Dr. Mills. Yeah, but as as we were talking earlier, I think everybody wants to have a piece of the pie related to dogs. Quick question. Coming back to that study, group A, B, and C. I'm predicting group A did the best, huh? Yeah, I mean they they actually both did good, but group A did the best. Yes. What was interesting about that study, what really was interesting is because of course you're measuring stress, you're doing all the cortisol levels and all this stuff, which which I kind of want to talk to you about the cortisol levels stuff because I really personally, from everything that I know, I don't believe that that's a good way to say that you're stressed to the point that this is something that you should not do because I think cortisol level can

um but but but let let me we we we we we'll talk about this in a second, but uh the group A did the best. The other one, group B, also was fine. And and the the cool thing is they just like anything, you you stress out when you're learning something, especially when you want to learn. Like if I I always give these examples of of if you if you're a student and you sincerely want to do the best you can tomorrow at your test. You're going to be sick that night. You're going to be studying, you're not going to want to eat, you're going to be stressed as as you can imagine. And there is really nothing that's coming from outside. It's your own motivation to be the best you can that puts that stress on you. When we always measure stress, especially when we measure stress during the processes, not after. Which is the the the more important part. You know? Because if we're thinking any electrician that goes to work let's take the the ones that climb these crazy heights with this insane uh uh level of of electricity. They don't go today's the day that I'm going to die on that pole to work. They go to work, they know they're making good money, and they know that if they stay consciously aware there is nothing to worry about. That's that's uh you know, as long as you understand I mean I mean it comes back to contingent versus non-contingent. It's a it's a big deal. Surely if I if I walk in in my training room and I touch something and I get zapped I touch it again, but I didn't. Then I touch something else and I get zapped. I'm I will walk out. I'll be like what the I don't know what's going on. Yeah, you might not walk out if you were receiving uh packets of $100,000 here, $100,000 there, the zaps might not be so bad. That's true, too. We actually when we train sometimes and even even during the the class when I have the courses and stuff, we we would have few drinks, we will be talking dogs, and we will actually do something like this. To where we will put some electric collar, and there is certain amount of dollars on the other end of the room, and and some people make it, some people don't, and you know, but but you want to play. And you want to play, or you don't want to play. And how motivated are you for that goodie? It brings a super good point. Uh I mean, we do it as a game, but but there is a lot to take away from from that silly drinking game. Victoria Stilwell, she has, you know, she has her academy, she has this thing, and it's so easy when when things are presented in a certain way to you. Like, do you want to be the bad person, or do you want to be the good person? Do you love dogs, or do you want to punish them?

That's how things get presented. And and what do people do? Of course. I mean, who who is this, you know? And as I was talking to you earlier, you know, the Of course, there is not cases out there. But those people, it doesn't matter what you're going to ban and what you're going to take away. They're just bad people. They don't need anything to be bad people. There's always a heavy hand. That's kind of hard to ban that. Right. So, what what Victoria was doing in one of her, cuz she has a school for trainers, so she brings this electric collar, and of course, they call it shock collar. And it's like, oh, I'm going to use it on level one on me, on my arm. Okay, I feel it. It's a little tingle. It's okay. Now, I'm going to use it on level two. Ooh, that hurts a little bit too much. Now, I'm going to use it on level three. And I'm like, "Okay, Victoria, why?" I mean, obviously, if level two hurt you enough, like what is the point? Like, why would you go to level three? To prove that it hurts? Of course it hurts. It's meant to hurt. But the the interesting part about electric collars is that it really and I'm not saying that things cannot go wrong cuz there is plenty of things that go wrong. But again, when done correctly, when you use electric collar, what happens is the brain gets triggered and it hits that panic button that says, "This is an emergency. We may die." But we know very well that this is not an emergency and you're not going to die. It just activates that part of your brain. That's the beauty of it. But otherwise, it's completely harmless and you use that in your advantage. It's the reason why in in all the laboratory studies, they don't use two-by-fours or air puffs or things like that cuz animals get injured every day. I mean, you know that. You you've done that all the time to where the using electricity tells the brain the right, "Hey, watch out. This is something you don't mess with." It's a controlled, measured aversive stimulus and but two-by-four, which is not so controlled or measured. Yes, and You can argue, as Steve Lindsay does in his books, that the e-collar is a unemotional way to administer it that by removing yourself from I mean, that he's basically what I'm getting at is he's arguing the electronic being remote has some advantages as a way of punishing an animal as compared to doing it physically. Yeah. Yeah. And about you know like this is like uh the reason I brought Victoria in the conversation is that says oh this hurts really bad. Now let's go higher. I'm like why? If if this is enough for you not to do something we are good. Really? Wasn't enough for her not to do things. Right? I would argue. Right.

When I and I use a level that works real good and no the animal doesn't want any more. The person doesn't want any more. I'll tell you a really funny story. Really really cool one. I was giving a seminar in I think it was Romania. It wasn't Bulgaria it was one of these European countries. And I was trying to explain how negative reinforcement would work and of course it was easier to explain it with an electric collar. I asked for a volunteer. And a woman like she just rushed to be the volunteer. Like like I'm talking just jumping through the desk to come to the to the front. I'm like okay. So I put the collar on her and I put her hand on the wall. I tell her move your hand and then I tap her on a very low level. Like really low level. I say move your hand and then I then tap her. And as I tap her she's holding her hand but she is now overreacting. She's like I'm like okay that's a little weird. Kind of catch me surprise me, you know? Cuz it doesn't move her hand, but it's ah and like I'm like, "Okay. Let's do this again. Move your hand." Little nick. Ah! I think she'd probably do that even if you didn't do anything. So, she had a point to prove that electric is very bad and punishment and any not punishment, but just the use of a VersaVice very bad. She clearly came from that camp to the workshop to prove that point. Yes. So, I stopped and I have a conversation like, "What what are you trying to prove? Do you understand what I'm trying to do?" She's like, "No." It doesn't matter what you're trying to do. You're using electric. Yes. She's like, "No, I don't understand and I'm very upset." She's trying to to do all the things that science says that happens and she wants to prove me wrong. So, guess what I do. I don't tickle anymore. I actually go on a level that I know that she's going to respond instead of acting out that she actually will feel it. So, I say, "Move your hand." And she's like, "Ah!" And I go bam and she go boom and moves her hand. I bet she did. I'm like, "Let's do this again." Now she's looking at me and she like you can see how all of a sudden it's not going her way. But now she's in front of everybody. I'm like, "Put your hand." So, she puts her hand. I put the call I put the remote control on the table. She doesn't know. Everybody sees it. I'm like, "Move your hand." Boom! I'm like, "Thank you. Have a seat." She jumped. Of course she did. It's It's nature. Now on on the other side, you know, like we can talk about this cuz that's interesting always to me because the the force-free community always bring this comparison of Okay, this is the reward-based trainer and this is the punishment How do they call it now?

Not punishment-based, but Correction-based? Punishments I think it's punishment-based or something something really dumb like like you cannot possibly have punishment as foundation of your training. You just cannot. Well, you or I might not, but hey, people are creative. I I mean, how? I I always would wonder how How can you actually do everything only by punishment? It would be the same way that the purely positive folks are doing are completely ignoring punishment. So, the theoretical purely I'm not sure I I have trouble calling it purely negative. I think you understand why. not just even negative. It's It's not that it They're not even saying that you're Yeah, you're not saying that you're using aversive or you're using negative reinforcement and positive punishment. They're saying it's punishment-based training. Which means you're only punishing actions. You're You're not asking for anything to happen. You're only stopping. Correct? Theoretically, you could be punishing inaction. Lack of action. Like you told her to move her hand. Mhm. If she didn't move her hand, she She moved her hand ultimately. You made the action happen. I can see that. Man, that would be that would still be very uh um Years ago we talked about a variety of operant conditioning paradigms including active avoidance, passive avoidance. Yeah, but but man I don't see this to always punish and to believe that actually the dog's going to choose to do the things that you want them to do cuz that's what they suggest when they say punishment-based. Like like they they truly want you to believe that they do nothing but punishing. I I don't think I mean I I I've thought about it. Can I do it myself? And I know I cannot. I don't think you know like we're not talking I'm not talking a simple one or two behavior. We're talking a performance of of of anything, you know? And you just have punishing be- punishment as your only option. I see it as a continuum. Mhm. And unfortunately the purely positive folks don't even acknowledge that a continuum should be because they refuse the use of any kind of aversive. But I see um I mean myself I I'm light-handed. Um I use aversives kind of like a scalpel to fix things. Right. They're not my major tools, like Right. But other trainers I'm sure like the e-collar is a major tool. They get started it with that as a puppy and so that type of person would definitely be further down the continuum than I am. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. I mean I'm such a big advocate of of education. I wouldn't say that I'm advocate of punishment because that that's ridiculous, but educate and and ev- you know, like like things work and

if they work, we need to understand them and we need to get good at them and use them for what we need to use them instead of going through I don't know. I mean think of any behavioral problem that's a little bit more serious and more more persistent. And a force free trainer will go the route of we're going to go some differential reinforcement programming and we're going to take our time and we're going to take two steps towards the whatever it is the the And if it doesn't work, we're going to step back and so on and we're going to teach something incompatible and we're going to spend three months or three years and eventually the dog's going to be 7 years or 8 years and it it wouldn't matter or the owner's going to be like I cannot do this. I'm taking that dog to the shelter. And all scientific papers. I mean there's just zillions of papers. It's just we we shouldn't even be talking about it, but differential reinforcement combined with punishment, especially if you especially if you don't know what's reinforcing or you cannot control that reinforcer that creates the bad thing. Punishment does magic at that moment and then you take it to the differential reinforcement and now you have a plan. I couldn't agree more. As a my business as a canine consultant, much of the time is teaching people how to appropriately use punishment, how to use it in a humane and appropriate way to get the effectiveness that you're talking about. It works. The reason I was bringing this up is because I I talk about it so much so much and sometimes I feel that I shouldn't because it's really I mean it's everything is of interest as a doctor and trainer to me. But sometimes on on social media I would defend the use of electric collars. Guess what happens? The the worst crowd is trying to team up with me. I'm like, "Dude, we are not the same." Just because you and I hold remote collar we are not the same. Like I cannot like please don't tag me in your posts. And just like you were saying like I mean it is a little puppy. Why do we need to do this? It's not a if you if you're so big on electricity, just get two magnets and use the plus and minus and play with them, you know? You don't need a live puppy to do that with. Of course, if the puppy I don't know. It it I had a I mean I mean just just recently here I sold the puppy to somebody. And they had to go to Arizona. And the puppy is 8 weeks old. And but they had to go visit some family in Arizona. And you know how Arizona has the landscaping, it's all gravel and rocks and whatever. So the puppy's never seen it and decides that rocks are cool. So it starts swallowing rocks. So I get a phone call. I'm like,

"Well, don't let him." He's like, "No, you don't understand. Like when I touch his stomach, they're jiggling in his stomach. That's how many rocks he's ate." I'm like, "Exactly. Exactly. I'm like, okay, let's take him to the vet. Let's hope that maybe he can poop something out and they don't need to open him at 8 weeks old. And whatever it is, call me after you get there and after get back and let's see what we do. Luckily, the the puppy pooped everything out. I mean, they did x-ray a few times and and got cleared and whatever. And I'm like, well, there is few options. You either have to keep it away cuz that's all it takes, a little puppy. He'll forget like 3 days, keep him away from the rocks and he'll probably forget about it. But if you cannot, then the other option let's just suppress it right away, boom. To where it's worth it, to where it's like, no, don't question rocks are bad idea. It's a easy concept. In situation like this, yeah, sure I would do it. But to go nick and nick and working level and like just this constant electric stimulation on a on a forget a puppy, any dog. I see it as a lack of understanding. They think I I I have a feeling that a lot of the especially the young trainers, it's not so much about accomplishing something with a dog and put keeping the dog in the right mind, but proving to themselves how good of a trainer they are. To where the the actual being, that little dog, is not the important part. The important part is how good of a trainer I am. Look what I can do. This is uh um I don't know what you see around in your in your experience, but I I this is like my observation lately. I think that's more common in competition. Less common in pet homes. But sure but the professional trainers that work with pet owners do the same thing. A a lot of them at least. I mean, you have the divides, of course, right? But, um It's like, "Oh, no, we the first thing is we we not going to actually make that dog like us. We going to start zapping him like a using him like a remote control car. Like, "Okay, go away, come back. Go away, come back. Do this, don't do this. Do do do do do do do do do do do." It's like, "Hey, that thing has a little somebody there. Acknowledge him. Give him some love, at least. At least. Take your time. Like, yes, you can teach a dog to heel and sit and down in 2 weeks. And then the next trainer is, "Oh, I can do it in 1 week." It's like, "What are we racing for? Just to to burn the fuses of the animals?" I I want to hear some of your when you did all the laboratory stuff, any anything that would stick out right away in your mind, any any kind of story. I really want to any any of those

of any of your research or any anything that you played in the laboratory environment that was that you got surprised. The study involved excessive drinking behavior. It was related to some of the research, um John Staddon had done. And I was brand new grad student. It was early research. And you know, I I the animal's supposed to the rat is supposed to drink too much. Like, a normal rat might drink 10 ml. An adult male, a large rat might drink 15 ml. water or alcohol or Okay. Okay. Water. Water. Actually, it'll even work with alcohol and I did studies like that as well. 5% alcohol, a way to get the animal drunk. As a result of the training over days, they begin to drink excessively and within 4 days the animal drank like 40-50 ml and I didn't believe it. I thought that I made a mistake. So, the next day I camped out and watched the rat in the cage and sure enough, it was drinking like a maniac and then it was urinating and then I realized that no, I didn't make a mistake. Uh it really was drinking too much. I always thought that was kind of funny because it was just like, "Wow, this really happened." So, so what did you make of that? Well, it was this complex stuff of of why does it drink too much? It's It's some complex phenomenon. It was called schedule-induced polydipsia. Uh dipsia is drinking, poly is too much. Uh schedule, schedule's reinforcement. So, basically, what we did is it was originally a study by Skinner and uh Staddon proved Skinner wrong in this case. Uh it was called superstition in the pigeon. And basically, what Yes. I I struggled with that one. I Man, I've read that one like so many times. It was some fixed up. But that was a study where Skinner gave the pigeon some grain, some food every 15 seconds. And the pigeon started doing He did this with a bunch of pigeons and they all started doing goofy behaviors in between the food deliveries. And Skinner said it was the accident that the food rewarded the behavior. Right. So, whatever the rat the rat was doing just prior to food delivery that got rewarded. Well, Staddon and a colleague Simmelhag, Staddon and Simmelhag showed that that was all wrong. That uh biology plays a big role. And if you take a thirst a hungry rat and you give it food regularly, uh you can generate this excessive drinking. Uh if I put a uh wood chunk in the cage, I could generate the chewing at the wood. Uh they call it pica. Uh if I put a wheel in the cage, I could generate wheel running. But the the thing that Staddon and Simmelhag showed was that those weird behaviors, they don't happen just before the food as Skinner predicted, but Skinner never looked at the rat in the cage. Staddon

and Simmelhag did. And when you look at them, you see that these behaviors, they're not related to the food. They're generated by the schedule due to the animal's biology. Keeping it simple. Uh but it wasn't It was a mistake by Skinner. It was an interesting mistake. man, he has few mistakes, but he saw saw Anybody that that's pro that is that productive and prolific is going to make some mistakes. Yes. But Skinner, as as uh Dr. Staddon indicated, was a most interesting individual. A a brilliant man. Have you Did you have a chance to to meet in person or no? Skinner. Uh Skinner, I once attended a seminar he gave, but that was along with 3,000 other people. Sure. Well, it's still something. It was a couple years just before he died. So, I never uh spoke with or met Skinner. I did uh meet some of his students and stuff like that, but not Skinner himself. Awesome. Man, thank you for this. Uh we we got to can in person sometime soon. It's been a very long time. But you do travel, hey? You pass through my neck of the woods, we get together. What I'm doing now, I'm I'm I just bought this uh Sprinter van and I'm converting it and I'm going to load up some dogs and I'm definitely coming your way. Only in Chicago I connect with you. I'm not that far from Chicago, 4 hours. Definitely doing it. Thank you for joining me and of course you know when I when I get some study that I'm going to get stuck and hit a wall I'm calling you. Thanks, Mark. Have a good night. We'll talk soon. Thank you.