FEATURE | BEHAVIOR MATTERS
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dogs after he was attacked by another dog at the local dog park. When I first began working with Emmett, he showed signs of high arousal, such as hypervigilance( he was always scanning), piloerection, growling, barking, and lunging at other dogs, often from 100 feet or more. After several months, however, Emmett was able to tolerate the presence of unfamiliar dogs in a non-aroused manner with little or no reactive body language. Here’ s how that happened.
For several weeks, I had Emmett’ s owner work on behaviors like Relax on a Mat. I condition dogs to regard the mat as an environmental cue for lying down and assuming a calm body posture. In this respect it is very similar to Wolpe’ s construction of counterconditioning as reciprocal inhibition by activating deep muscle relaxation. CMC then“ borrows” the dog’ s history of positive conditioned emotional response to the mat and mobilizes this to help him relax around previously worrisome triggers and in spaces where he might feel anxious( training buildings, agility fields or the front porch). The mat functions as a portable safe space that handlers can take with them when working with their dogs away from home. The mat helps handlers build a consistently predictable outcome for the dog: once he is on his mat,“ stuff” – sudden environmental changes, fast movement or the approach of a trigger – may happen around him, but he doesn’ t need to worry about it. This is partly because an inviolable rule of mat training is that, when a dog is on his mat, he is not available for interaction except with the person doing the training. This is part of the mat’ s calming properties and must be strictly adhered to by both humans and dogs. It also enables the mat to be a safe and predictable traveling rule structure for the dog.
CMC then pairs these relaxation techniques with teaching specific cognitive skills that dogs reactive to other dogs( or any scary stimulus) desperately need, but do not possess. These skills are especially urgent for dogs that are worried about their environment because they often acquire, process, and interpret environmental information in distorted ways( I often call this a dog doing“ bad risk assessment”). The emotional distress of these dogs is all too real, but they perceive danger and threat where it doesn’ t actually exist. CMC, as well as the Look at That protocol, helps dogs develop more non-aroused mechanisms of perception, learning, memory, and decision making( for an in-depth discussion of the cognitive work done by the Look at That protocol, see L. Donaldson, 2017). For example, if a dog receives a high-value food reward every time he looks at an unfamiliar dog but does not react, he learns to make better decisions about his behavior and to perceive the environment – and the unfamiliar dog – more accurately. However, teaching a dog to disengage from the concerning stimulus is just as – and perhaps even more – important as teaching them to look at it. With the CMC protocol, dogs literally learn how to turn away, both physically and emotionally, from the triggers in front of them. I introduce the cognitive skill of disengagement by first having a dog look at a trigger and then placing treats on a dog’ s mat. Most dogs will naturally look down( and away from the trigger) to access the food rewards, and this begins the process of learning how to disengage. It also creates a positive conditioned emotional response with experience of seeing the trigger, whatever that might be. The precise CMC sequence would be:
• Dog relaxes on a mat and looks at the scary stimulus( here, the other dogs behind the dog park fencing).
• Handler marks this behavior.
• Dog looks away from the scary stimulus, looks down to access treats on the mat and in so doing, begins learning how to disengage from his triggers.
• Dog’ s behavior matters!
The images( above) demonstrate this sequence with Emmett and his owner.
Figure 1: Emmett looks at dogs behind the dog park fencing. Owner marks this behavior with a verbal“ yes” and puts a treat down on the mat.
Figure 2: Emmett disengages from his triggers to access his treat on the mat.
In this picture, Emmett was located about 75 feet from the fencedin dog park area. I staged the training so that Emmett’ s mat and body position were turned at a 90-degree angle from the dog park fencing. This set Emmett up to practice in an almost exaggerated way both the muscle memory and the cognitive skill of disengaging from triggers Emmett perceived in the environment. Figure 3 was taken later in the same session.
In Figure 3: I staged Emmett’ s mat and body position so that he was directly facing the dog park fencing. This was more difficult for
46 Building Better Trainers Through Education Photos: Laura Donaldson