The hardest thing to do is not getting a dog to perform a behavior, but getting the dog to do the behavior all the time no matter what. It's so easy to teach a dog to sit. No matter a person's experience with dogs, I've found that all but one dog I've trained knows how to sit before we start working. These inexperienced dog owners/handlers can make the dog sit some of the time, but the dog doesn't do it all the time no matter what. This illustrates that training is the easy part, anyone can do that. Proofing is what's hard.
Proofing a behavior is the process of getting a dog to do a behavior all the time no matter what. It is also one of the more important concepts in maintaining a dog's training. Proofing exists in two major categories: 1) desensitization and 2) obedience.
Proofing by way of desensitization means exposing your dog to new things and ensuring a positive and successful experience. Let's consider a dog who is generally dog aggressive. In my house and front yard, this dog will interact very nicely with other dogs. When at the park, this dog will tear into other dogs. What we can assume here is that this dog has the ability to play nice with other dogs. The question then becomes, how do we proof this good play with desensitization? The short of it is that we start from a distance away from other dogs in which he will not react and slowly move forward from there.
The only reason a dog performs a behavior we don't like is because at some point the dog was rewarded for that behavior. In a more traditional style training, we would essentially use aversion therapy and try to replace those positive associations with, in our case dog aggression, with negative associations, using collar corrections, shock collars, spray bottles, etc. That's one way to do it. I do not think it is the most effective, though it is the quickest to produce changes in behavior.
The slower, but more fun way is by treating your dog every time it is not trying to attack another dog and treating every time the dog is behaving how you like. When I say every time, I literally mean 1 treat per as fast as you can treat. What this does is 1) creates a positive association with being around other dogs and 2) teaches your dog what to do when faced with a situation in which the dog would normally be aggressive. Doing this slowly and making sure your dog never goes past the threshold of success should proof the behavior of playing nicely with other dogs.
One of my favorite things to do is obedience. What I love more than obedience, is going out to my favorite stores and doing obedience. My clients will attest that my college graduation level test for dogs is going to Bookmans (local dog friendly used book store) and doing all of our obedience. Sit, down, stay, loose leash, etc.
Now this graduation requires a lot of desensitization as well. The key difference here is that behaviors in desensitization are about what the dog already does, whereas obedience is about what behaviors we've taught the dog.
Honestly, I didn't need this whole length to describe proofing behaviors. It really is a simple concept. It's the precise execution of constantly changing criteria that is hard. When is it appropriate to push your dog? When should I pull back? What am I expecting? Criteria setting is going to be next week's blog. It's the next important concept in proofing because it is the finer detail of it all.
To end, I'll provide a brief list of important reasons why proofing is important. 1) A dog that listens in all situations will be less likely to get injured/injure others. It's safer. 2) A mentally stimulated dog is less likely to cause trouble. 3) It's more reason to get out a do fun things with your dog. 4) It's fun to include dogs in the family.
Let me know what you think! Comment here or shoot me an email at michael@concentricdog.com
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