Development of Desirable Behaviors in Dog-Assisted Interventions.

Félix Acebes,Clara Muñiz-Diez,Ignacio Loy,Juan Luis Pellitero

doi:10.3390/ani12040477

Félix Acebes, Clara Muñiz-Diez + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/ani12040477

Copy DOI

Abstract

Simple SummaryIn a recent paper, Hall et al. encouraged professionals of canine training to share their observations and procedures with researchers in the field of dog learning and cognition, with the goal of coordinating knowledge and make better use of time and resources. In response to this invitation, here, we present an integrative method for the training of dogs that take part in animal-assisted interventions (AAI). This method has been developed taking into account the needs observed during nearly 30 years of interventions for the cognitive, relational, functional, and emotional improvement of the users. This method focuses on the dog, developing in the animals the necessary skills for their inclusion in dog-assisted interventions from a constructivist perspective, while guaranteeing their well-being during the training and the execution of their tasks.Dog-assisted interventions (DAI) are those that include specially trained dogs in human health services. Often, the training methods employed to train animals for DAI are transmitted between trainers, so the latest scientific research on dog learning and cognition is not always taken into account. The present work aims to evaluate the impact that the main theories on the evolution of the dog have had both in promoting different training methods and in the relevance of behavior in the evolution of the skills of actual dogs. Then, an integrative method for the training of dogs is presented. This method takes into account the research on dog learning mechanisms and cognition processes, and effectively promotes the development of desirable behaviors for DAI during the dog’s ontogeny.

Highlights

In the last years, to other disciplines related to learning and behavior, animal training has been influenced by the cognitive paradigm in psychology, highlighting the active role of the subject in its relationship with the world and proposing explanations based on cognition to account for the behavioral results that cannot be explained from behaviorist approaches
The method proposes to choose, from the available pups, those more predisposed to follow an unknown human, that show cordial interaction with their littermates, take part in the social cohesiveness of the group, avoid open conflicts for the available resources and show interest to novel sounds emitted by humans, approaching to identify them, and not showing fear or avoidance. The display of these behaviors between the fourth and eighth week of life of the pup is not a complete guarantee of the success of the training of the Dog-assisted interventions (DAI) dog as it does not test specific behavioral or cognitive skills, but demonstrates that behaviors related with the essential abilities for working dogs [19] can be identified in the selected pups, at the beginning and the end of the critical socialization period [109,110,111], with observation criteria that can be operationalized in order to design experiments that might lead to new developments in the field of selection and training of
Dogs, unlike the dogs that are familiar with a conventional use of the leash, have to get used to uses of the leash adapted to the needs of their work, pass through doors with different strategies depending on the user they go with, climb on the furniture in work centers against the usual educational rules, stand on their hindquarters in different situations during sessions, etc. In such a varied environment, discrete training can lose its effectiveness [112] while a flexible basic training, focused on the cognitive development of the dog, guided by the needs that the dog has to cover in its adulthood and is sustained by rewards that are widely and frequently present in the final working environments, allows the constant development of new skills during the daily life of the dog, this being our final goal in the training of DAI dogs

Summary

Introduction

Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. In order to include a dog in DAI, it is only needed to develop in the animals those behaviors that, being part of the natural set of behaviors of the species, are desirable for the intervention [19]. Those behaviors that correlate with a positive evaluation in the accreditation of work dogs and that are mainly related to social education are usually trained by methods based on classical conditioning, operant conditioning, or, in a few instances, social learning [18]. The method exploits the learning processes that the available research indicates dogs use during their ontogenetic development, promoting the natural behaviors of the species that are useful for the interventions from an approach coherent with the physiological and cognitive skills as well as the needs and the motivations of the animal

The Method as an Educational Process

Dog Selection

Skill Training

Conclusions