Training Without Conflict® 팟캐스트 에피소드 70: Ana Catarina Vieira de Castro

rarely, rarely we have acknowledgement that dogs, just like humans also, gain confidence from overcoming challenge, from facing controlled adversity, from mastering things that are initially somewhat uncomfortable. And another one that I want to kind of go with is, do you do you, do you see any benefits to aversive or just not at all? Because as I've talked to different people, that there is some very, very extreme takes and there is some more more centered positions and opinions. And that would be interesting also to go over. And what, of course, what the science says matters. And what is the end goal, I guess? Is it, are we genuinely striving for better welfare? Or is it the elimination of anything that doesn't fit within that philosophical position? So, yeah, I think, I'm, again, as I said, I'm really looking forward to talking to you. Almost surprised me that you took the invitation. I was very, very reluctant and I didn't even know how to approach approach because I have approached almost everybody that I think it's worth talking to. I really believe that even though we have opinions, having the conversations can help us really bridge some gap and get better understanding and just staying in our lane and, you know, having the social media wars and what science says and what science says and what this trainer says and what this trainer says and I think it's very productive. So, again, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. And just briefly for the people that have not heard of you, just give some brief introduction. Okay. So, first of all, I'm very pleased to be here. Ivan, thank you very much for the invitation. And so just to briefly present myself, I'm a biologist by training initially. And then I did a PhD in experimental psychology. That's where I started to learn more and do more research on animal learning and behavior. And also when I started to learn more and behavior. And also when I started to learn more and do more and do more and do more and do more. And also when I started to be more interested in the dog training world, because I always had this passion about dogs. I was volunteering at several NGOs. And when I was in that beginning phase of my life with dogs, I quickly understood that I lacked the knowledge to be dealing with those dogs in that context. And I was like, yeah, okay, so I also really need to get some training on this area. And that's also when I started to search for some dog training courses. There were not that much, at least here in Portugal back then. This was in 2008, I think, more or less.

And so I started to learn more and more. And so I started to learn more. And so I started, but I found one course at that time. And it was a purely positive approach to dog training. And it was also when I started to get this notion that we had among dog trainers, different philosophies of approaching dog training. And that we had these people that were just fighting against each other all the time. And sometimes not even wanting to listen to the other side, to the arguments of others. And of course, then in parallel, I also started working with dogs. I started working with some dog trainers, of course, to try my hands-on experience as well. And during this course, of course, when someone presents me with, at least in theory, at first with an approach that does no harm to dogs, for me, that would be my preferred approach. And so that was the one I took in the beginning. And so I started to learn more about how to do things. But I was always an open-minded person. And I started to notice that for some specific types of breeds and some specific types of behavior, at least no one could present me with very effective solutions to solve or to control some sorts of behavior. And so I started to be very curious about the differences between force-free methods and balance trainers and those more old school trainers that were really only about coercive methods. And since I was going into a research career, I decided, OK, so I think this is the best way for me to try to answer or to help answer my own questions. And I think questions of the dog training community, like which methods actually work better? How do they impact dogs' welfare? So in a way that we can actually get some data that says to us, OK, this is the best approach. Of course, this is almost utopic, let's say. And of course, this may come up during the conversation. But my idea here was to contribute, at least in the science part. And of course, during these podcasts, I will sometimes talk to you as an academic, as so from what I've seen in my studies. But also, I am a person, I am a dog trainer as well. And so I have also my opinions. OK, so we have some facts from science that I will bring to our conversation. But of course, also some of my opinions, opinions, but I will try to be very clear in what are my own opinions and what are, of course, the facts that science brings us. And the first thing I saw when I started digging into the literature, the scientific literature in dog training, was that it was very, very badly designed

and usually very biased. So in a sense that it almost seemed that people first they had like the conclusion. So I'm speaking about researchers and then they designed the studies in order to like prove that conclusion. And we know that this is not how science works. When you are doing proper science, you have to put your hypothesis at test, like, you have to defy your hypothesis. OK, you have to try to prove, for example, that the hypothesis that, let's say, force free methods are better for animal welfare is wrong. And that's how you should design your your experiments. OK. And so there I found a huge gap. And then, of course, we have had a lot of studies that focus on that used questionnaires to address this welfare issues. The surveys. Yeah. Yeah. The surveys. And this is tricky because, of course, we know that even unconsciously people may be biased to. To give answers in a certain way that are not quite true. And those studies in those studies, it's always also very difficult. For example, I can ask you how you train your dogs and then I can ask you about some stress signs that they may exhibit. But I will never know which one came first. It may be the case that your dog was showing more problematic behaviors that led you to to search for for those kind of. Yeah. Yeah. OK. And of course, I always saw a huge focus on e-colors, which I think. Yeah, it's clearly the the the the the tool that causes the most controversial part. Yeah. Yeah. No question. No question. So probably that's why most of these studies and they are not that many were focused on e-colors. And I was interested also in other the other types of techniques that that that that are used when we talk about being. So what's dog training about? It's not only e-colors versus all the rest. Of course, I think that if you are studying e-colors, you should focus on e-colors. But it's not like balance training is not necessarily about e-colors. And I'm not saying that e-colors are the worst technique. I know I'm just talking about it because I think it's apparently the most controversial. OK. And so when I developed my studies, of course, I was also very interested in a pet dog training because most of the studies were focused on more controlled populations like police dogs, military dogs, lab dogs. And of course, which brings its own its own its own benefits because you have usually the same breeds. So less variability. So you can control more the variability in your study. But this may not. I mean, this does not represent the entire dog training scenario.

And yeah, we have and we have military training, like even the regimes of training, the reliability that you may need from a dog or from a sports dog, an IGP dog, for example, may be completely different from a companion dog. So it could be the case that for some of these populations, like for companion dogs. I don't know, maybe force free methods are as efficient as methods that combine the four quadrants of operant conditioning or not. And this may be different for other populations of dogs, like dogs to do obedience, FCI obedience dogs to the IGP police dogs. OK. Yeah. So. Yeah. And that's basically where where my my studies came in to actually have a look at the time on pet dogs. And importantly, I mainly or basically studied the welfare impact of these methods. My idea at the time was to proceed with my research and also investigate the efficacy of these methods, because this is important when we are talking about dog training. It's not only about the welfare impact of these methods. I mean, this is this is a tool that was built for us to achieve something. So it's important to know if these different methods can actually give us what we need from a dog. Yeah. Yeah. No, absolutely. And of course, efficacy. In a long run could be detrimental to welfare, right? Mm hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Then again, there's an interplay here between, of course, the efficacy and also even how quickly these methods also produce results. Of course, we can go into a very deep discussion around here. But if, for example, I can give a very, very simple example, if I have a dog and so this is hypothetical, OK? I'm not saying that I agree with this, but imagine you have someone with a very huge dog and the dog is not walking because he pulls a lot on the lead. The dog is not getting properly exercised. It will probably take more time to train that dog in a reward based approach than with, for example, a pinch collar. Mm hmm. Mm hmm. And so when we think, of course, we can think about the welfare, it will probably or not or not be better for that animal stress levels to use, for example, a front clip harness. And I'm saying probably because we know that this kind of approach may also cause frustration to the dog. If we are going to, for example, that stop, stop and start technique where the dog, if the dog pulls, you stop walking. And as soon as the dog loses the leash, you start walking. Yeah. For dogs who pulls a lot, this may be very frustrating. Kindly frustrating, for sure. Yeah. I agree with you. Yeah. I can't walk. I can't walk. I can't walk. I can't walk. Okay.

And sometimes with just a pinch collar very quickly, you can have, okay, you can cause maybe a bit of pain to the dog very, it may depend, of course, but very punctually. And but very quickly, you can start walking that dog as well. Yeah. Because sometimes very often, sorry to interrupt that, just to go along with what you're saying, because I totally agree with you, like totally agree with you. Because often, at least in the States and from what I've experienced across the world, when I go, timeline also, it's important, right? Like how long, because by the time a pet owner says, I have a problem, typically they're already past that break point. They, like, they are so impatient from that point on that they need to see something. And, yeah, it's a, it's an interesting world because you, you know, as trainers, we have to navigate and definitely consider 100% the welfare and the best option available. But we cannot disregard, as you said, efficacy and timeframe of, you know, in some cases, in some cases, of course, we have pet owners that are willing to, to put the time and, and they're definitely not getting rid of the dog and they're very willing to do whatever it takes. So there is very different, you know, situations that we cannot just clump them up in the same, you know, dish. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I agree. Of course, I mean, here I, I know, we have a big, also a big way still to educate people because of course, people shouldn't only search for a dog trainer when the problem is very bad, of course. So, yes, here I could say, okay, but people should search for, for a dog trainer early on. So before the problem is like really, really actually intense. But, and so we should never disregard this, okay, this part, I think this is very, very important. So I never want to give the impression that, okay, if you let your dog escalate to that point, I will always be able to solve the situation, even if I have to introduce some aversive-based methods, because I think it's maybe problematic because we know that people tend to be a bit lazy, not all of them. And not only search for solutions when things are really bad. So I always like to say that we should, of course, in parallel to what we are doing, educate owners to search for help earlier, and really early on, so that they never get to that stage. But just to close here, my reasoning, and I'm going to see, I'm going back to a question that you asked, do I see any benefits to aversives?

Yes, I do. I think they are part of nature, that's not what I think they are. I mean, dogs learn by aversive experiences in their daily interactions with the world. They learn by aversive experiences with other dogs as well. Of course, I think that this is what's critical for me at this point is that I feel one thing, Ivan, is to have an experienced dog trainer working with some kinds of tools. And another thing is having an owner using them with no timing, with no idea of when, how to explain to the dog how to get out of that situation. Yeah, there is no question that things can go sideways very fast when, when, and it happens. It's not that it doesn't happen. We should not pretend that this doesn't happen, right? Yeah. And so, I don't think like that, for example, e-callers should be available for anyone to buy them. I've seen people working with e-callers with, in situations that I would, I would never say when I started my, my career that, does that dog have an e-caller? Because I just see the dog wagging the tail. Yes. Okay. Oh, I see what you mean. Initially we have, and of course, because this also happens. Okay. People that, situations where people are really like messing up the animals. And so this, we shouldn't deny. So this exists. This exists and I feel like, like, this exists and it's a serious issue. And we need to figure a way how to resolve that for sure. Yeah. But yeah, my initial idea of, so I think it's instinctive. We think of, of shocks and we think that the animal will be in pain all the time, not knowing what's happening, especially because there's no connection, no physical connection to, to, to the owner or the trainer. And so it's more difficult for them to associate what's happening here to what's happening. So what the owner is asking, but I've seen like training sessions with e-callers that I would never say the, if I didn't know that the dog was, had any call or wrong. Okay. That's the, that's the benefit that you have, that you are around dog trainers and not dog trainers specifically in one circle, in one bubble, but you actually are truly exposed in, in like you've, you've seen good training both sides from what you're saying. and, and you've seen like, if you, if you observe long enough, you definitely see some really ugly stuff that's happening that just, you pull your hair and you're like, how can you even think about doing like what, what is going on and why, you know? Yeah, exactly, Ivan. So yeah, I think that the, the fear here is always that, uh, since we have these, these tools and, uh, these techniques on,

something has to be done in a way to control who's, who's able to, to use them. Mm-hmm. Uh, like regulate the use of, uh, I mean, dog training in general should be a regular profession here in Portugal. It's not, so it's not, uh, recognized. So anyone can, can say like, uh, I could start like a dog training, uh, company tomorrow. Yeah. That's pretty much the, the most of the world, right? Yeah. Yeah. I know the places that are, however, like, let's say, I mean, I, again, I kind of like, I have connections and friends and just in, in all sorts of different circles. And I know, like, for example, in Germany, to be a professional dog trainer, you have to go, you know, kind of the German way. You have very different things that what other countries would do. They, Germans like the structure and, and in many cases, it's very productive, very beneficial to have. Um, I've gone through their tests. And it's very heavily on the R plus side. Mm-hmm. To where there, there are questions, there are actual questions in the test that if you don't answer it the way they expect you to answer them, you will not get a license. And what I mean by that is you have to, at all costs, avoid the versus. Um, and that there is, you know, decentization, counter conditioning, primax principle, differential, whatever, that they will always be a substitute. And, and a lot of times a better, the, the better option. And, you know, when, when it gets to that extreme to where a trainer, to become a professional trainer has to actually consciously. Don't agree, but have to check the box because otherwise they will never be a professional dog trainer. You know, these are, these are, these are kind of the problems, I guess, overall that I see with the licensing and, and because of the, I, I, yeah, like I was saying in, in the opening of the podcast, like, it's very interesting to me why, why we have to throw the baby with the water. Um, because, like, there, there are definitely times when positive reinforcement and when I'm talking about positive reinforcement, again, I'm talking about all the sub products, sub, you know, training plans that can be applied because they're quite a bit and they're very, very intelligent and they're very much based on science. However, science also shows that clearly there are situations where there is an innate genetic predisposition that's going to activate a different motivational system. that external reward, no matter how you play with it.

It's not going to necessarily depending again on the level of, of intensity, what we have being genetic predisposition, being past, uh, history or combination of both. But, to say that, um, the one size fits all glove, it's very problematic and so many people insist on that. Just like on the other side, there is the, you know, the trainers that just, no matter what, they, they always believe that the dog is always showing their middle finger and they're always doing things against them and they always have to, you know, like, like, like, like, it's so hard to even listen to somebody that thinks like this about dogs. Um, but how do you think we can create this licensing that we need, but not to try so hard to pull the rug either direction, but actually have some, something that helps everybody. You know what I mean? That's like the $1 million question in my head always. And I go back and forth on this all the time. Sometimes like, yeah, we need that. And sometimes it's like, I don't think we can get there. So we better not touch it because who knows, let's say, even if we agree on something, how rigid that system is going to be. Just like in, in politics in the world, you know, then, then government changes, then somebody comes in and, and it's a, yeah, it's a very interesting situation. What, what, what is your take? I mean, I'm sure you've thought about this as well. Um, the licensing. Yeah. So, but the first thing I, I, I thought about, uh, was of course, first of all, we need a licensing. That was, that's probably my main concern right now. Uh, I, we really need to distinguish between, um, so then of course we would need to, to think about the, the curricula. Uh, but we need to be able to distinguish between someone who actually has some proper training in dog training, dog behavior, dog welfare, and so on and so on. And, uh, someone that was just like, uh, having a course online. And I, I watched this sometimes. I, I had a neighbor here some time ago. Uh, he told me he took a course online, uh, which was pretty much based on aversives. And he was just, you know, like doing harm to dogs. Yeah. Like no, that, that, that was not training. And of course then, uh, the dog and he had like a, it was kind of a melinoir, melinoir mix probably. And you could see, I could see daily, like some problems, some by, by, by products of his bad training. Um, like the dog started to be reactive around that dogs because she was being constantly punished and never rewarded. Um, uh, and okay. So we really need to, uh, to say, okay, these people, uh, his ability to be a dog trainer.

Uh, and this is not, this, this one is not, um, and this will probably have to be centralized by the government. And they, they need to be advised by people who actually understand about these, these, these, uh, these matters. Um, and here, uh, of course, we need to get some dog trainers in. And this, this will, it's very complicated because, uh, we see the discussions nowadays, like, uh, people like you and me would most of the time. Uh, so we are the exception. I have some friends. Unfortunately. So someone who works with e-callers, uh, sitting next to me and we are friends and we train together, even if I don't use that tool, uh, you know, this is rare. This is very rare from what I see. Um, and I really think we should bring these people together, uh, to share experiences and actually, uh, and this is, this is for both sides because I see people working purely reward based who have never seen, uh, what I would call a good training session, for example, for a recall with any color. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Right. Uh, and in the other side, the same, there are some people who work with aversives that don't really understand, uh, what's, uh, the sensitization about how it actually go. It's not, or counter conditioning. It's not only about giving treats to the dog. That's not it. It's much more than that. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. I agree that that's, that's one of the, it, it frustrates me sometimes to listen to like the balance side of trainers, because. It always comes. Sooner or later in a conversation, it's going to be well, but is it reliable? And yes, it can be highly reliable to where, to the, to the point that. I, I will tell you just as, as a side story. Um, I, I was having, uh, well, I kept, uh, cause I've been breeding Malinos. I don't know if you know, I mean, I've been breeding Malinos since 1989. And so we kept a puppy for training to eventually become a protection dog and, and so on. And he, he had a very nice upbringing, like all the, I mean, you know, I, I wouldn't say that there was no aversives because I believe that sometimes a dog should know that something is off limits. Uh, instead of going about around that. However, like talking about the recall is where I was going. So it was all for, uh, force free. I mean, it's all, you know, I call you and you get paid and we have a big, big. Big, big. One day. I some, somehow there was a conversation. I think it was because I also have a school for dog trainers and somehow it came like, well, how would you teach with the electric color? If you do work, how are you going to introduce this in a recall? Where it's going to come?

And, and I decided to make a video. So to make that, that story really shorter. I could not create a situation where I could use the electric color because of the foundation that I've done through positive reinforcement. Like I literally tried to put food on the ground. I got his leader mates out to play. I was looking for so many different things to create a situation where he would not want to come. And he beat all of them to the point that I was like, you know what? Like anything from this point on will be totally unnecessary and unfair. And, and this is, you know, something that a lot of times I believe that the balanced community doesn't, you know, they, they, everybody looks down on everybody, but. They, they always think that reliability has to come through some trial and error or some adversity. And disregarding the fact that you can create a very strong habit that it's, it becomes very reflection, reflexive behavior. And, and, and, and, you know, it will override a lot of problems, just like how you would put a seatbelt in your car and you're like, I don't know where I put it on. I just did. And, and you get, you call your dog and they just come. It's already so ingrained because of the foundational training. And so it's interesting that, you know, there is, there is that disconnect of balance training and always, you know, it's a, it's a big thing about reliability. We always will say, well, it's cool. It's all fun and games and fairytales, but, and there for short place and time that positive reinforcement is all need. Mm-hmm . Now on the other side though, also there is the times when kind of what I was saying earlier, like you, you wake up a different motivational system that comes from within the generic sleep disposition. And no matter what kind of external reinforcer you provide and how much decentralization or how much differential reinforcement program, this is a highly, it's a very different part of the, pattern that's a wakes and, and then it becomes very tricky because when you like, when you deal with decentralization, decentralization, right. You can, you can get so, so close to the trigger. Let's say, let's say, let's talk about like innate predatory motor pattern, right. Chasing, whatever. So you can present it and you can really, really, but there is that one point where that always like, the dog is like, but that squirrel now is alive. Yeah. And, and you have the two types of dogs that the one's going to say, I'll just hop around cause it's fun.

And the other one's going to be, even though there is no past experience, it's going to be locked in and that's it. Yeah. And it's very hard to unsnap. Yeah. So these are the kind of problems that are interesting to talk about, interesting to discuss, interesting to find ways and collaborate between each other on. But we, we just always like this. So how can you collaborate? Yeah. So just to finish. I know I went all over, sorry. No, no, no. That's, that's, that's perfectly fine. Ivan. Yeah. Because we were talking about how, how, how to define, like how to regulate license. License. Yes. How to license it. Of course here I have to, to bring science in as well, because that's also my background. And I think science can, if we are talking about good science, that is something that I always thought that could like make the bridge between people that are just arguing because my method is better than mine, but my, but your method harms dogs. If science is well conducted, it can inform us objectively with no bias, with no ethics about what actually is the impact of these different methods on the animal's welfare and on, and what's their efficacy. Okay. I think this will always bring very important because it's objective information. It's not what you think. It's not what, not what I think. That's not what comes from your empirical experience or mine. And so I think really that science needs to, to come here, and say, okay. And of course, this is a huge world because it's not one study. Sometimes people think that it's like one of the studies that I published. It showed that dogs that were trained with aversive methods, so underwent more stress during training sessions. But then only if these were applied in real high proportions, did this affect the dog welfare in the long run. So it's like something like if I'm only trained the old school way, like coercion, coercion, coercion, coercion, I'm feeling stressed during the training session. And I'm also not happy when I'm in my daily life. Right. It carries over. It rolls over into your actual other part of life. Correct. Exactly. Whereas dogs that were trained in what we would call the more mixed approach or balanced approach. So where we had rewards balance with aversives, these dogs, of course, felt, of course, in my study, more stress during the training session than did the force free trained dogs. But when we looked to the carry over effects to their daily lives, there were no differences. Right. So we could say that something simply these dogs were as happy as dogs that were trained with reward methods.

And so this kind of information is important. Okay. And also there were some e-colour studies sometimes some years ago around 2012 in the UK. Yeah. That really didn't show that much aversive effects of e-colour training on dogs. They did. Yes, you're right. But somebody had to, somebody like you, that knows what to look in the study can find this. Yeah. But otherwise, if like for the most part, you know how people do, they read the abstract and the conclusion and cherry pick the certain things that you like. And, and what you just said, it doesn't rarely comes in the conversation, right? Yeah, it's tricky because usually people are not educated on how to read the paper, but this is, this is also a problem of science itself. Because science also needs to, academia also needs to be able to better communicate with people because we also cannot expect that the way we write papers will reach everyone properly. And of course we have to be very cautious because I have that kind of situation with my paper as well. The, this paper that I just, I just spoke about. Which one are you talking, the carrots or the? The, the, the, the other one. The improving dog training methods. Yeah, yeah. On the welfare. The pessimistic, optimistic. Exactly. Yeah, yeah. That one. So some people are saying, okay, so this study shows that aversive methods, they do harm to dogs. Wait, that's not what they say. And if you go to the discussion, and this is very important that you recognize the limitations of your studies as well. Yeah. Okay. And I understand that, of course, if you are eager to see that kind of results out, you just read the abstract and that's what comes out. On the other side, I also have people, I think they were from an e-collar company from the UK. They, like, show me where does your paper say that e-collars harm dogs. And I was like, it doesn't say that. I didn't study e-collars. Okay. I'm not like against you. I'm just showing and it's very clearly written in the paper if you read it. That's the war. They're saying that e-collars are bad for dogs. And so I think here we need to also to educate people to read. And when we're talking about dog trainers, people that actually think and that are eager to learn and want to learn. And so I think that we do that. We teach them how to. What do you have to look to? And I do this a lot in my webinars to different audiences. learn to read the paper. Okay. How do you, how can you tell that this is a well conducted study? So, see, look at the data before, even before looking at the, what, what the authors wrote as conclusions. See yourself the data that is in there.

And of course, science has to also be able to, to better communicate with people and make things easier for people that aren't. And you know, what is crazy also with this is the, now that we have the opportunity to just upload something to ChatGPT or whatever AI you're using. However, the AI already knows where you want to go. So it kind of gives you what you want to hear and unless you challenge it and unless you know exactly what to prompt it, which goes right back to what you just said, that you have to still understand how to read the paper. Yeah. The AI cannot, not that cannot, but it will not give you the information that you're searching. No, if you don't train it, you have to be very good at training it. Yeah. To, and that creates a big, that, that actually almost fuels the, the, the battle because on both sides, you think, well, my AI says this and my AI says this and, and it just escalates more. Exactly. Yeah. Perfect to the same. Yeah. So we won't get to the answer today, of course, Ivan, but I hope we, we can think together to contribute to. Right. Well, some understanding here in the, in the dog training world. Um, and going back to the, your, uh, you use the one size fits all in this case. I also don't believe that we can say that, uh, one size fits all when we are talking about the dog training. Um, and, and I've also like tried to address this in, um, in research. And every time I read papers because how I was saying like training a companion dog to walk on a loose leash, uh, to be calm at home. That's completely different from, uh, training a military dog. Mm-hmm. Training, for example, what I have now an Australian shepherd to walk off leash with me. I mean, it's so easy, but I had, I had, uh, a Portuguese pudengo before with a very, uh, a very cool. Yeah. They're very nice, but she went like, she went, it was like, it's a trend. They, they, they just go. And I saw at least with, with what, with what were and are my training methods. No, I had no capacity to recall her with force free methods when she went into that, that state. It's like they, their mind just, it's like, it goes somewhere else. It's like, now I'm a, I'm, I'm a predator. It's a, this interesting reinforcement loop that is just, as you said, now I am the predator. And, and, and, and yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And they, it's like, and you have to appreciate it in, in its own beauty too, even though. Yes. Sometimes you don't like it, but it's all of a sudden it's like, I am, I'm for a moment. Let me be a dog, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. She, she was doing the job. She was amazing. Yeah. So breed matters.

Training a companion dog versus training a dog for dog sports versus training a dog for police. Maybe different. The breeds are different. Some breeds are, are stronger. Of course it's, you have to be very careful when using aversives with a border collie or an Aussie is completely different than using them with a Malinois or a working line German Shepherd. They're very different breeds. Yeah. These guys are very sensitive. Yeah. Some German Shepherds are really, really strong. I mean. Yeah. And that, that's kind of comes down to like, even if you, you know, I often ask and I, I actually will ask you probably eventually, or maybe even now, like I, I asked that question to, to people that I invite on the post. That, that, do, do you ever would say, no, don't do that? Like, do you ever say no to the dog? And, and you get different answers. Sometimes, you know, there is the, the very hardcore. It's like, no, I don't need to say no, because I'm going to go around the problem. I'm going to enforce something else. It's like, what, but do you, do you not want the dog to actually know that that whatever they were doing, it's actually not, maybe it's dangerous to them. Maybe it's dangerous to them, maybe dangerous to somebody, it's just not appropriate to do. Do you not know, want them to know that? And where I was going is this, when we're comparing, like assuming that, let's say me, I would like to be, say, I, I personally like to have my dogs and that's what they are always. They, they have the ultimate freedom to do whatever they want to the point that somebody probably will call a dog trainer for me to help me. However, they all know that I can say that this is going too far and they know how to tone down the game. They know how to stop to chase something. And other than that, anything really goes. So when we're talking about, regardless of the breed, but just an individual dog that's way more sensitive and way more responsive, you can just say, hey, buddy. Yeah. But as you said to some really in a different situation and a different breed, they will be like, so what? And they would not respond. I don't think they even listen. Exactly. They would just go by. Right. Yeah. Yeah. And, and it is important as you're saying to, to understand differences, understand the motivation that it's playing in the moment, because that dictates how you behave, you know? Why do you think the community cannot have this conversation that you and I are talking right now? Because we really, I think this has never happened before. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's the trickiest quick question that. I don't have the answer either.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I, I, I imagined that. So I was trying to think a little bit because I have like in my entire life, been able to have this kind of conversation with four, maybe five people, including you. I think, or, or they often probably happen, but they happen not in a public space, right? Yes. This kind of conversation. Yes. Yes. Yes. Because even, even in a, when I was presenting my data in some scientific congresses, I had two different kinds of approaches. I had some people coming to me. So those people that you would say that are really pro force free methods coming to me and saying, you have to be careful when you say that aversives do not cause harms to animals. And I thought like, okay, we are in a scientific conference. This is at least the place where this kind of personal bias should not be. Should not be. Okay. Here we are talking about data. And I also had someone coming to me and saying, your work is really important. And I think you are very brave of coming out and here and not being only showing that reward is the best. And it's the best, it's the most efficient and the, does no harm to animals. And that's what we should use. So, and of course I understand, and you know as well Ivan, this, the problems that can arise if people just start to use people, especially not trained and informed. No, the concern is no question. There is a, it's based on, it's not, it's not. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No question. So, I understand that it's difficult to have this conversation because of those potential, the potential impact that this may have on uninformed and unskilled people. Okay. So, um, And I, I think I'm thinking most probably because that's probably who I heard the most is people coming from the force free community, uh, telling this to me. Uh, so it's, it's tricky. It's, it's difficult. It's like, it's dangerous because, uh, then it's like you are promoting, uh, and people, you will use it indiscriminately. Um, and there's this risk. Um, and so of course, if we think about, uh, licensing and regulating, we need to, uh, think very wisely, uh, about this. Uh, so coming from the other side, um, I, I also, uh, I mean, uh, the side of people that, uh, work with the, the four quadrants of operative conditioning. Um, I, I think sometimes they, uh, they saw it, it works. I mean, it works. It worked my entire life. Uh, and now these guys come here with the foot and try to teach me. So a bit of, uh, I mean, I learned this way. It always worked. Uh, why should I change? Uh, especially for a method that it seems to me that takes longer.

Uh, and then I already have this mindset that, uh, the dog has to obey to me because yes, you know. Uh, and so I think maybe these are probably the two main, uh, things that make this discussion so, so difficult. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. At least I think this is what I can extract from, um, my interactions, my, my conversations so far with, uh, with, uh, with different people. Um, your, your studies are, I mean, even when you like search and see how much there have been referenced and, you know, they're, they're highly, I mean, I mean, they're influencing, uh, the dog training industry. Um, and, and, uh, the, uh, the R plus community, uh, um, at least in the extreme form of, uh, are really trying very hard to point out that it's, it's a very clear evidence that positive reinforcement is superior at any time. Um, and, uh, and why, like, my question is, why do you think is such a, there is such a high motivation, such a high drive to, to push that narrative that we should just accept that science says that adversities are bad. And that they, at any time create stress and lifelong blowbacks and, and so on. Um, is it because, like, I, I, I have few ideas and, and one is maybe those people understand that that's not the case, but they don't believe that. If you allow anybody to use it, that means that the majority will just do stupid things to dogs and animals. So we would rather just pretend that they really never have place in dog training. Another one is that maybe some, some of the very, uh, uh, uh, animated proponents on, on force free. They, they really just believe who may like, like, like, let, let, let's say somebody from like the higher, the more, uh, respected advocates of force free training. Would cite your study and some other studies that, you know, says, Hey, positive reinforcement, it really works. And, and, and basically take it to the extreme. And then people that don't know, then they go on the forums and it's like, well, science says, and it's evidence based. And it kind of stops the conversation. Like you cannot have a conversation anymore because if you try to, then you are one of the people that just disrespect science and does, and it's basically a Neandertal, uh, stuck in, in, you know, what do you think is the motivation behind the force free community?

That it's so strong against any kind of aversives, at least it's the, it is in the States, but I'm sure it is in, in, in Europe because of, I mean, you see all the bands and legislations there. Well, yeah. Keeping on tricky, tricky and difficult questions. Um, if you don't have it, you do, nobody has it. You know, it's a mystery to me. Yeah. Yeah. I'm thinking about it. Um, I think some people actually, so in this force free community, um, if you see, I mean, this, this is pretty much what happened with, um, the education of children is this, uh, passing from coming from a very aversive education. Yeah. Yeah. The, the, the belts and the spoons. Yeah. And going to exactly the other extreme. Exactly. So I think maybe some form of rejection of these methods of these initial methods. And I have the same regarding how doc training was done, uh, some years ago, uh, in some situation, it's like, I would never do that. That's completely unthinkable for me. Uh, it causes me, uh, an aversive reaction. And the same, if I think about, uh, children, uh, and maybe a way of like getting distance from these is like refusing, uh, anything, uh, actually creating an aversive response. Like dogs may make, uh, to some stimuli. Uh, so maybe this can be behind that. It's like, I don't even want to hear about that because I've seen what these people. Did they like to put some, everyone in the same boxes. Um, uh, I have no idea that, uh, like e-caller training has changed a lot, um, with time, for example, uh, better balance trainer, uh, good. Good, uh, a good trainer. I, I like to speak about good trainers because I, I, I know good trainers who work with the four quadrants. I know very good trainers who, uh, skip most aversives. Um, so in the end, it's not really about, uh, necessarily the tools and the techniques. Uh, it's about you being good. Of course, the risk of doing harm to an animal. If you are dealing with aversive is higher than if you are dealing, uh, with the force-free methods. Worst case scenario, uh, with a bad trainer, with force-free methods, you can cause some frustration and you can have a disobedient dog. Mm-hmm. But you will not shut down a dog. Of course, other things being equal, uh, so if we guarantee that dogs have their needs met, exercise, mental stimulation, and so on. Um, so I think it may be somewhere around here. And regarding science, it's, it's very important that people understand that one study does not define science. Uh, so we have a recalled state of the art. It's what we, we presently know about this topic. And sometimes the, the evidence, uh, is weak. Sometimes it's moderate.

Uh, sometimes it's strong. But it, it's always prone to be, uh, changed. To be defied. Like, science is evolving all the time. It's not because I showed in my study, I, I found that this was the case, that aversives cause more stress during training sessions if they use in, they were used in high proportions. That if someone tries to replicate these, uh, we'll find exactly the same. So science needs a lot, lots of studies and it's constantly evolving. So it's constantly open to new studies, new studies and studies that try to replicate. So, or, or, and sometimes they can't replicate. And this happens in other areas of science, not only dog training. Oh yeah. Yeah. It's okay. It's crazy across the board for sure. Yeah. So I'm always very cautious. I, when I talk about my studies or other studies that I see in the literature, you, you can see, okay, it suggests these results suggest they point to, uh, it's not like it shows that you cannot say that with two, three studies. Uh, that's speaking about good quality studies, probably what we have right now, something like. Four or five studies. Um, and, uh, remember that, um, define science is part of doing science. So define other studies, define results. Like this is what Katarina's study studies, uh, show. So this is the conversation. So this is the conversation is ended. No, I can, we can discuss about, uh, the studies about the experimental design about, uh, maybe some overstatement of results of conclusions. Maybe some limitations that the, the, the, the author was not able to acknowledge when they conducted the study. So there is no perfect study. Right. So, even if, even if you have to do it today, I know you would do it way better. And, but still, if you do it. Two years later. You will have. Uh, another different take, right? That, that you will improve on it even better. Yes. And, uh, and it's very difficult to conduct because we are working, especially with companion dogs. It, of course, in science, we try to, to standardize everything as much as possible. And we thought that's very difficult. Right. It's not like I have these animals in a lab and all the owners are the same or the trainers are the same and they apply the techniques in the exact same way. So we really need, that's why we need big, uh, numbers of animals when we conduct, uh, these studies. Um, and unfortunately I, I didn't have, because I, I didn't have a funding for proceeding my studies because my next step was to actually dive into the efficacy. Uh, that's a question that I had for you because it kind of, the way you lay out the plan for that future one.

It was really, really good. And then I'm like something happened. So, so what you just funding or. Yeah. It's funding. It's funding. I mean, I tried it, uh, and I actually had some and the timing is important in science funding. I have, uh, after these papers on welfare and relationship to owner. I started to develop very interesting collaborations with the Portuguese army, with the Portuguese police, so they wanted to participate because they were also very interested in the results of these studies. I think it's important for them too, you know? Yeah, yeah, it is. They are, and I have some very good friends, training dogs in these institutions. Now, of course, that I met through our change of ideas and our collaborations, but in the end, it seems that Portugal and Europe, are not willing to pay for me to do this research, so I can cry for that here in your podcast. Do you think it's because there is some kind of resistance or concern that maybe the study is going to... Show what they don't want to say. Right, I mean, could be something like that. Yeah, it's difficult to know, Ivan. I think probably the thing is that the funding for science is becoming more and more scarce, and when funders have to put in a scale whether they will fund a study on dog training methods or on cancer, I mean, for them, I think there's no doubt if we have a few money that it has to be allocated. Which makes sense in the big, you know, of course. Our little dog problems are nothing to humanity as a whole. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. But yeah, but sometimes I just found that people, some of the reviewers, so we submit these applications for funding, and then we have international reviewers assessing the quality of our proposals. I think some of them, maybe sometimes it's our fault, sometimes I don't know, but maybe we cannot show them how important actually this is for... Because it's an important issue. I mean, we are dealing with a lot of dogs. Now that we are talking a lot about investing more in national defense, for example, having military training dogs reliably is important. Yeah, we need to get serious. It's really... Yeah. You're so spot on on this. Yeah, and I was trying always to sell the idea in a way, of course, that it becomes important for society, because in the end it is, of course. If I put it in a scale with cancer, I understand that cancer gets the money. But sometimes it was just unfair to me. But somewhere, well, this is life. You feel, okay, I had such a nice project, and it was not that much money, and this would make a difference, you know? Or, of course, not.

It would add more information to this discussion that otherwise seems to be eternal. Like, actual life. Talking about the military and police and stuff, you know, like I... A very good friend of mine, his name is Markus Neutsch, he's a very good IGP trainer, but he's a police officer. He runs a K9 unit. He's been all of his life, as far as I remember, that's his passion, and that's what he's done. And once a few years back, when the ban of tools came in Germany, he was universally, you know, accepted for anybody, which, again, it was the wrong thing to do because it leaves these police officers with... They either have to hide, which is really unethical to be a police officer and to break rules that the... The rules, of course. You know, it's just very, very tricky. Somehow, they convinced the government at the time, and the government bended a little bit and said, okay, you can use the tools during employment. Basically, like, if you're on the street and you need the dog to apprehend a person or detect something, you can use the tool there. And what all these trainers are like, I don't need the tools there. I need the tools for training. For training, of course. Because if I train right, I'm not going to rely on these tools, right? Yeah. And these are the interesting dilemmas and problems that this kind of universal decisions don't take under consideration. And as you're saying, the more you... If you see what's happening in the world, I mean, there could be really tomorrow a need for the dogs that are very different dogs that can really help us out. But, yeah, it's a... I don't know. I don't know. You know when you did the one... What was it? The literature review? Like, I don't know which year you did, but you kind of went over a bunch of them. What was your overall take, if you even recall? I know that was a while back. Yes, yes, I really do recall. You know, like, what was the overall your take on how things are done and what we can improve? And, you know. Yeah. So back then, actually, that was the study that set the stage for my next studies, because that's when I saw that there were very few studies conducted on the topic of dog training methods and impact on welfare or their efficacy. Most of them have important limitations, methodological limitations, like we were talking, that you were... Survey-based, most of them. Mm-hmm. And in the end, the main conclusion was that the evidence for a negative impact of aversive-based training methods on dog welfare was scarce. Okay? Was weak. Was weak. That... It wasn't enough, right? It wasn't enough. No, it wasn't enough. It wasn't enough.

There was some suggestion that there was a correlation between the use of some aversive-based tools and some stress or behavioral or physiological stress markers in dogs. But it was weak. It was like, you cannot use the literature up to date. And, of course, this was all back in 2017. But the literature back then was not enough to, I mean, for example, to inform legislation. And the studies that I did after that, they came in a way that I wanted them to cover this hole in the literature. But, of course, there were two studies. We needed more. Yeah. I know that two or three more studies have been published since then. Still, not enough, Ivan, I think... At some point in the conversation, I know we're going to talk about the one that Clive and Noreen Johnson did. I'll actually show you some short clips of it. Okay. I mean, we're not going to share it everywhere, but I'm curious to have a conversation. Okay. You know what is interesting to me is that even the earlier studies, even then when they point out that non-contingent use is a bad idea, everybody just grabs a strong hold on that sentence as it's a bad idea, but seem to forget the important part that says non-contingent. Like you take the shock yesterday, whatever year it was, I don't know, or seven or six or... Four, yeah, something like that. She had the three big old groups, right? She had the... Yeah, yeah. Whatever the... How she named them, I can't remember, but the one was basically just random shock. The other one was simultaneous shock. And then there was the group that it was done properly, like in the right order, so the dog can predict and make a choice. And of course there was a... Even in that group, there was a stress involved during the learning process, but once the dog had the solution. And the study also says that it's... That was it. You know, they were... It was effective and there was no long-term, you know, blowbacks. However, nobody ever, ever talks about... I mean, not nobody, but nobody in the force-free community... Yeah. ...ever, ever wants to have that conversation about being contingent versus non-contingent. Being in control, meaning you have... You truly have a choice to do what you want to do and take your chance or avoid it, right? Why are we going so hardcore? That's kind of seems to be the theme of my podcast today, but I really wish we figured it out why we have to... Disregard that something can be beneficial and just lump it in all the bad situations.

Because I'm yet to hear one in any place, anybody to actually point to the good side of this kind of studies. Always we amplify the bad, the worst case scenario, if you want to call it that way. And the worst case scenarios or the best case scenarios... Typically, these are your two extremes. We're always working somewhere here. Yes, that exists and yes, that exists. But for the majority of time and training, this is where we are. We need to acknowledge the danger. There is no question that we need to acknowledge. I mean, this is the whole point about it. But again, it's throwing the baby out with the water. And I don't know, like... Yeah. They're very interesting to me. You know, the one... The... Like Cooper and Daniel Mills, you know, the first one, 2014. 2014. Yeah. I mean, there were so many different problematic things with it. And again, just as you said, every single study will have... Like if you want to find something that could have been done better or something that wasn't better. Yeah. Absolutely. This is just part of this nature of how you collect studies. But it's a... What to me makes it very difficult is that it's one of the most cited. I mean, that probably, you know, okay, Van de Bork and Schidler, you know, they kind of started the trend. But it was Cooper and Daniel Mills that kind of really set the tone that positive reinforcement trumps aversives, even with predation. And this is a very, very, very strong argument to have. Understanding that you... You're a professor in a university and you're teaching that subject and you have to know. Like I highly question that you can not know the problem that it's... I'm going to expose right now. And that is, if we're talking about predation and we are comparing efficacy along with welfare, if the ships are in display pans, that they barely can just even turn around and walk. And the dogs are on 10 feet leash, regardless of its positive reinforcement or electric color. But the problem... It's like... Blinding me.

Of böyle Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast Infrast we're not going to get interested because it wouldn't trigger that whole pattern of, you know, orientized dog chase crap, right? So that was something that, and in the study, of course, they acknowledge that, you know, it's unethical and they cannot just let sheep and dogs free and see what happens. But then my thinking is if you cannot really create a situation where that predatory model pattern is activated and you can see what works and what doesn't, then what's the point of the study? Because if we take the efficacy and focus on the welfare, it's kind of, I don't, you see where I'm going with this? Like it's been very interesting to me. Yeah. And if I remember correctly, so I don't remember if the sheep were loose. I remember that, first of all, I don't like to speak only bad things about studies. Of course.

Actually, that study was one of the first ones that compared methods that I think were like well designed. Of course, it has their own limitations. It has. And one of them for me, if I remember correctly, was that the recall was tested with the dogs on leash. Right. And this is complete. We know that dogs, they know very well if they are on leash or if they are off leash. Yes. And it's like you can't, I can't have a reliable recall if my dog is in a 10 meter leash. And this is completely different from having my dog off leash a lot of like several meters away from me. Right. My meters. Okay. I remember. And of course, I know it's like it's difficult to. It's like I cannot let the dogs lose with the sheep lose. It's a problem. But maybe just the dogs lose. In a way like that the sheep were fenced, but the dogs could actually run away from the trainers. Yes. Provide that opportunity to some level. Yeah. That was a good idea. What you just said. Another one would have been a muzzle. But like what I'm sharing on the screen, this is basically a photo from. Okay. It was even a shorter leash. Yeah. I think it was actually a short leash. Some of them had shorter leash in the study itself. They were talking about 10 meters. 10 meters. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. But I remember asking also myself. Okay. This was reliable. Okay. So, but what they can say in a situation like that is that if you have your dog on leash, both methods are equally reliable. This is what you can conclude from their study, which I think it was one of the most well-designed ones. But of course, you cannot say that if your dogs are off leash, both methods will be equally reliable. So, what kind of laws do you have in Portugal as far as walking dogs? Is it always on leash or? On leash. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Unless they are, then we have like some weird things, some gray areas in, because I think the law says something like if the dogs are on training, they can be off leash, but then we don't have regulation for training. So we like a hole in the regulation. But you're right. Right. Right. Right. Yeah. And that's another thing. Very, very, very well organized in maintaining and, you know, following, checking on people with the laws and some just cannot. I remember myself, I was in a competition, I don't know, maybe 2017, whatever. It was a while. It was before COVID for sure. I was in a competition in Austria and it was just, I mean, it's Austria, it's just beautiful, just mountains. And there is nobody, I mean, there's like nobody, it's just me and my dog. And I mean, it's a highly trained dog. Like there is nothing that I cannot stop him not to do if I needed to.

So of course he's off leash and we're just walking. And next thing you know, there is this, you know, police four-wheeler kind of car just comes to me. And it's like I had to show them the vaccination passport, that I had a muzzle, that the dog had to be on leash and that I had the poop bags and all this. Which, okay, I mean, that's the country's law, so you have to obey the laws. But as a whole, this is an interesting question and hopefully not as tricky and complicated. As a whole, what do you think are the expectations of a pet dog, companion dog that's trained strictly to positive reinforcement protocols and a balanced dog that is trained, you know, using whatever whatever they saw fit? Neither one has a, like, behavior problem. There is, it's just basically just a pure outcome of like, what, what do you think are the expectations of the two groups? Regarding efficacy? How? How? I mean, not, not what the efficacy exactly, but like, like for me. I, my, my, my belief is that at least the people I talk to, trainers and owners, some owners like to, even if, even if that means they're going to break the law, but they like to just unclip that leash and let these two dogs to just go and have a good time right now. But they need to make sure that also there is a way that they can control the behavior. The dog. Right. Okay. To where I believe that the force free trainers as a, again, on average, not, there is always on both sides exceptions, but as a whole, I think that there will be not, that, that would not necessarily be the objective. It's going to be more of a, okay, there is fun stuff. We need to give them, you know, the enrichments and possibly nose work and so on. And, but they wouldn't let two males run free and possibly start to chase something because it would be hard to control, but they would say, well, the laws are against that anyway. So why would you do that? So I think you see where I'm going with this, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I like personally to unleash my dog. And so here in Portugal, it's a little bit, so the law is you have to have your dog on leash. And I think this is a good law for people to follow. Okay. And you should never let your dog off leash if you don't have at least basic training. But of course, if you, we are thinking, because I can think of situations where I can set a dog off leash that will probably cause no stress, no stress, no. No issues. No control. Yeah. No issues.

So like having, going to a beach here in the winter, it's pretty much no one there can have dogs off leash and they will eventually recall with no very intense distractions. But of course, so you can manage the situation. And this way, okay. You, of course, you can always manage, like, if you don't want to, to, to actually go through a very strict training. Because then people sometimes have also the expectation that they will be able to set their dog off leash, like a companion dog, and that the dog will recall no matter what with very little training. Right. Right. It's the wrong expectation, regardless of the method you are using. But of course, if you are telling me, would you put more confidence in a dog? And once again, I'm not going with the methods. I'm going also with the people that use these methods. Which one will be more reliable? I would put my coins on the mixed approach, on the balanced approach. Like that. Of course, this is my opinion. Again, I have not produced science that shows this. But my feeling from what I've seen so far, it will always depend, of course, on the dog, on the breed. But on average, I believe that it's more reliable, you will get more reliable control with, if you have some, some aversives in the, in the training. What is your take on the whole, right now, discussing stress is probably the hottest topic. And, you know, like you can feel everybody just being very, very, just standing their grounds and how, well, stress possibly is okay. But the dog doesn't have a choice if you're doing it. So if it's coming out of somewhere else or then it could be okay. Then there is long-term stress. There is short-term stress. There is distress. There is eustress. But it seems like that whole conversation around stress is very delicate right now. It's very fragile. It's like, well, is stress good or bad? Well, that's not necessarily even the right question we should be asking. But what can you tell us about that conversation? Again, it's really big right now, at least in the States, it's, this is ongoing wars on social media about what, what stress, if any, is justifiable. Well, and does the dog themselves, assuming all meats are met, do they ever search for a little bit of stress themselves to kind of spice their life? Like, like we do. Like, for example, I do rock climbing. You do climbing. I was going to say that. Yes. I think I don't have the answer for this, Ivan. I think it's a very interesting question. And first of all, I would like to address the fact that stress is actually, it's an adaptive response of our organisms, of course.

And they, it doesn't only produce bad, what we would say, bad, bad emotions or bad things. And I think here, I will go back to what you were saying before about the non-contingency versus contingency of application of an aversive stimulus, for example. From what I, I've been studying and learning so far, what's most important about stress is, is that you can control it and you can predict it. Control, controllability and predictability plays a big role in animal welfare. I would probably say this is a thought of mine that's probably even more important than the, so the existence of stress. So the existence of stress, I mean, this is part of life. Okay. When stress becomes unpredictable and uncontrollable, that's when it actually will harm what we call long-term welfare. So, think about the animal's inner state, affective state, mental state. And of course, if you have a lot of stressors, this also turns into chronic stress. Oh, it's rolls over. Yes, absolutely. Yeah, that's right. So, let me just interrupt here, Ivan, because I have 10, 15 more minutes. Yes. I will leave. So, maybe that, so that you can decide how to finish this conversation if you have... No, I really, I mean, as I said, I don't necessarily have a specific agenda. I think this is a, I really like just having a free conversation and just bouncing all over the place. And that's kind of what we are doing. I think it's perfect. Yeah. I think that's the best way instead of chasing something. But then, since we're limited on time, let me play you this clip of the, you know, because I know you're going to love this. You're going to love this. My issues here have always been with the fact that I had like dog owners in the studies, you know, and so sharing people's faces, it's an issue. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know why you wouldn't be able to show, because I think I've added in some studies, different type of studies, some videos of myself or some other experimenter with the dog. Because, you know, like sometimes a picture, you know, the saying says thousand words and it's so true, you know. And there is a point where it's like, okay, we really don't need to run the cortisol right now. I mean, if we really, really want, okay, let's do it. But we know. So what you're going to see first is this going to be basically the shock color group. some of them, but I'm just for the sake of making it short. But and this is day three. So you did five training sessions. Yeah. So basically the very first thing we did was we just selected because we that was one of the. the things that I think Clive did right. I think he did a lot of things right.

And this is one of them. And that was the selection process. We basically had. We the way we advertise that is that we needed some really hardcore chasers. Like, you're not just hopping five times and then you get bored. It's like you're really committed. And it's a, you know, you're that. Motivational system is clearly present. So from, I believe, I don't know, 60 dogs or so, we ended up with 20. Um, and so the old dogs, there is, I'm saying this is because all dogs were tested already. So they knew how to chase and then there were the typically in the shock collar group, most dogs stopped in the first day. Some dogs needed more help in, in more, more, uh, corrections, whatever you call it. Day two. And this is basically day three, what you're watching right now. And that's the, you know, the lure and it goes very fast. They can change speed and so on. Day two, yeah. This is the trainer with the black and, uh, the other one is the owner. The owner, okay. Yeah. Now he hears me talking. He's like, oh, maybe I have a chance with him. So what was cool is like, you know, they, I mean, they were just really, just got so bored that they were trying so hard to do something. And, and when you think about what a actual training will involve. It wouldn't be just let's stop them from chasing. We will absolutely offer them something else to do. Cause it just, I mean, forget about all science and everything. It just makes sense that that's what you will do. And they're trying so hard to convince you to like, why are we here? Like, what are we, what are we going to do now? I got it and I don't have to chase, but so are we going to just sit here and what? And so there were the, the interesting part with the other dogs, the, you know, the other two groups, of course, the, the one group had no chance to begin with. And, and, and, you know, you clearly know because there was no way to work around when a dog really likes to chase. You cannot already, that system is activated. So there is really no chance for you to, to get him or her to, to do something else. It's too late. So that one group, it was doomed, but that was the protocol that we designed because we wanted to see what can kind of work. The other one was heavily relate on descentization protocol to where the lure would not move at all. And then they will get food and they will associate kind of, you know, pair of work with, with the, when the food comes and eventually the speed picks up. And eventually, you know, we, I don't remember how many days, but eventually the speed is what the speed should be to trigger the, the, the dog.

And so these are dogs that again, they, I think two days ago, they were already chasing. Now there is nothing there, but they already, you know, they're like, okay, this might be there. And these are her treats. These are like really high, high, whatever it is for her. This is already in one day. Some, sometimes when, when it's already, you know, into real chase. And of course it didn't, it, it just, the protocol that you're setting up, it cannot prepare the dog for that. Like, and everybody was stuck on, well, the protocol we can do better, but. Yeah. I would agree with that, but I also understand that we're trying to standardize as much as possible. The groups in terms of how many opportunities that we have to learn. Right. I would not design the protocol this way myself. Of course, it would take longer. I would, if I was going force free. Yeah. It would take longer for the purpose of your study. Like in a way that things work as similar as possible in terms of how many training sessions we are going to play. Yeah. How many times we are going to apply the rewards or the correction. Yeah. You totally get it. Yeah. And, and again, the same thing goes both ways because no, no trainer on the other side of things will just shock the dogs. You know? Exactly. I was going to ask you about this. Yeah. This is the last one that is super cute. Yeah. But what I really enjoyed, Ivan was seeing the shock collar group dogs so relaxed from their body language during the sessions with, which was pretty much the behavior that I saw in some situations where I saw a polar training. And I was like, okay, they, they, I saw no lip leaking. I saw a dog sniffing around the tail in the relaxed position. Tell me about this. The, I know we are short on time, so I'm not going to keep it just like, just very, just two minutes. But if it's too long, just tell me and we cut it off. But, but cause you mentioned the lip leaking and all the, like the body language that we get to evaluate, to determine the stress levels and so forth. We know as dog trainers that also the exact same body language can be very functional and, and so the, for the moment it's actually quite appropriate and doesn't necessarily mean nothing more than I'm, I'm very focused. And maybe, yes, I'm, I'm stressing, but I'm stressing because I want to stress because this is kind of important for me and so on. So like, is all, why, why is it that all lip leaking or all low head position immediately gets in the study section in that part?

Like, can we design it in a better way that we can recognize that it's not always that or do you agree that it's not always that? Some of these behaviors are like low postures, tail tucked under. Some of these behaviors are like low postures, the dog is not always that. And so on. Yes. My approach has always been to combine different types of stress indicators, like watching body language, watching cortisol and doing that pessimistic versus optimistic. Test of, of, of, of dogs. So that we can have different types of markers and then be sure. That we can, it's like, we, we, we build a puzzle and see if we have. Low high levels of lip leaking. If we have high levels of cortisol, if we have a dog that is pessimistic in a. In a cognitive bias test. I'm pretty sure this dog is not in good welfare. So just to say that for a study, the study is as stronger as you come in with more markers. Okay. And of course I can see a dog that is just interested in the prey, like lip leaking, lip leaking, lip leaking. Okay. Yeah. But for example, yawning is already something that I usually see more in contexts where the dog is actually uncomfortable in a bad way. For sure. For sure. It's one of them, but, but yawning also. In some cases can be a preparation and expectation and, and, and something between. I'm being excited, but I know I gotta control myself because it's not my time to actually start the agility course, for example, you know? Yeah. Yeah. But it shows that the dog is in some inner state of conflict. Sure. And of course they use it to appease themselves. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But it's just that the, the, the idea of, of not distinguishing that functionality. Versus the, just the distress. Of. Okay. I'm, I'm really excited to get ready or I'm, I'm on a downstay, but I'm, I know what's coming next is going to be a recall. So I'm like lip leaking just cause I'm preparing for that. Yeah. Crazy, you know, but I, I know what you mean by. And you're like taking that collectively as well, of course. And the same with cortisol, you know, I mean, cortisol is not always a high cortisol is, you know, you can wake up and, and. and yeah it means go running and you're like positive right right right just the activation of the the the stress uh systems let's say that's why it should never be interpreted on its own alone yeah i mean you are just like excited like if i go rock climbing i'm pretty sure my cortisol levels are pretty high and they should be otherwise you would not be going and i'm enjoying so yeah yeah katarina this is really really nice conversation uh hopefully you

you feel the same way yeah i really feel i think i i only wish that we can have this more and because i don't know i think good things can come out from conversations like that so thank you thank you so much for for joining me and maybe i don't know i haven't been to portugal yet um yeah if you come let me know but the country is small uh i will get to you if i can of course okay and i hope we will have more opportunities in the future to absolutely absolutely this is a topic i really love and i would stay here if i didn't have any other other things to do i would just keep hours and hours around these topics that means i can message you sometime again yeah yeah yeah feel free right awesome awesome katrina thank you so much thank you very much beautiful conversation böyle