Stopping Unwanted Behavior—You’re Being Gaslit

00:00 — Kati Peppe introduces Off Leash and Unfiltered and Diamond K9 Dog Training’s behavior-modification focus.

Speaker 1: Welcome to Off Leash and Unfiltered Trigger Warning. I'm Kati Peppe, delivering the Truth in Dog Training.

Speaker 2: Hey everybody, welcome back to another episode of Off Leash and Unfiltered. I'm Kati Peppe, owner of Diamond Canine Dog Training in Biddeford, Maine. We specialize in eco training, we do off-leash obedience, behavior modification for things like aggression, anxiety, you know, separation anxiety, reactivity, all that stuff. Um, and we also do puppy training as well. So that's who we are and what we do. And this podcast is here as a way for us to hopefully reach more people, um, and get this information out there because it is really, really hard to find. Um, I know when I needed help, I had a hard time finding this information.

Speaker 2: So that's what we're here to do. And I'm usually talking about things that we are talking about with our clients day in and day out, our hands-on clients with our board and trained dogs and our private sessions.

Speaker 2: Um, because if this is the stuff that they need, then I know that this is the stuff that probably all of you need too. So hopefully you can get some good takeaways from listening to the show. Um, and today I wanna talk about something super, super common. I have this discussion honestly, with probably, I wanna say a hundred percent of my clients, right? But I almost, I never globalize like that. So, but it's close to a hundred percent as you can get. This is something we talk about with everyone. This always comes up and it's so important.

Speaker 2: People will say, and I usually hear this initially in our phone consultation, um, or even in the contact form before we've even spoken, that their dog doesn't respond to positive reinforcement or isn't responding to positive reinforcement or it's not enough for their dog. And this is such an important thing to talk about. I really think this is the most important thing we talk about. Because here's the thing about that, that's normal <laugh>, okay? That's totally normal. So one thing that really hits a nerve with me, um, very, very passionate about this is when we're working with somebody, and you know, especially when we're doing like group class, and so we have a lot of our clients in the room together and they're talking to each other and you'll hear them kind of telling their dog story and somebody will say, you know, that this one was just different.

Speaker 2: That, you know, positive reinforcement just wasn't enough for him. And I always chime in when I hear that and I say, Hey, that's normal.

Speaker 2: That's normal. So what they might be describing is that they, they had dogs previously that didn't have the behaviors this dog has. And that might be true 'cause all dogs are different, but I don't care what behaviors they have. If you want to stop a behavior, you're not going to do it with positive reinforcement. And that's as true for the last dog as their current one. So it isn't fair to say this dog doesn't learn the same way. This dog doesn't learn as easily, this dog is stubborn, this dog is defiant, this, no, that dog is normal.

04:00 — Kati says difficult dogs are normal rather than stubborn, defiant, or fundamentally different from…

Speaker 2: Just like your last one was normal. They might have different personalities, they might have different behaviors, but the rules of behavior aren't any different for this dog than they were for the last one or the last 10.

Speaker 2: You just finally got one that had behaviors you couldn't tolerate and you never learned how to stop a behavior because you never really needed to before. Which as a side note, I don't believe that either. No dog is perfect. There are always gonna be things you wanna stop. I don't care how good the dog is. Um, but people can, they'll often just decide to deal with it, right? They'll just tolerate it 'cause it's not that bad. Like if you have a dog that gets a little excitable or kind of jumps a little bit sometimes, um, people might just kinda let that slide, right?

Speaker 2: Um, but then you get a dog that's like a level 10 and you're like, oh my God, I have to do something about this. I have to stop it. And you don't know how because you've never done it before, right?

Speaker 2: But it's not that this dog's actually learning any differently than the last dog, it's just that you never bothered to do it with the last dog 'cause he didn't really feel like he needed to. And that's different. So we're pinning it on the dog and it's not really the dog, it's us. We never learned how to stop a behavior because we chose to tolerate the behaviors instead. So that's totally normal, totally normal. So I just had a phone consultation a half an hour ago, um, with a lady, with a dog, with some really serious behavioral issues, um, runs away, doesn't come back when called resource guards.

Speaker 2: Um, even guards her from her husband.

Speaker 2: And um, they're working with somebody right now who only uses treats, only uses rewards. And they're only a couple sessions in, but they know already that this isn't going to work. And they're right. It's not going to work. I don't need to be there. I don't need to see it. I don't need to meet the dog. I don't need to meet the trainer. It's not going to work. I already know that. Um, because I know that those behaviors cannot be inhibited without a punishment. They just can't, folks. So that's not my rule, that's just how it works.

Speaker 2: So all of our behavior is governed by consequences, right? So consequences don't generate behavior really, right? Genetics do genetics and learning genetics and consequences. So it's a mix and that's what leads to ultimately behavior.

07:00 — Kati explains that genetics, learning, and consequences combine to produce behavior.

Speaker 2: So, you know, she kept speculating that maybe her dog guards because, you know, maybe it had to fight for food when it was a baby. Uh, maybe it had an incident with a person or another dog, maybe, probably not, probably not. So it's interesting to me because as humans, and I'm not picking on her by the way, this is just natural. This is human nature, right? But this is why we do this. It's so important to talk about this stuff because people don't know. As humans, we tend to want to attribute every single behavior that our dog does to something they learn, something they experienced.

Speaker 2: We completely discount genetics and just the fact that they're a dog and that dogs do this stuff, it's in their DNA, everything that happens, we feel like there must be a reason for it. And it tends to be usually when bad things happen or things that we don't like or dog has behaviors we don't like, there has to be a reason.

Speaker 2: Something that happened to the dog, something they experienced, something they learned. Um, it can never just be right. So if your dog is sweet and lovable, friendly, social, confident, playful, those are all things we have no problem with. And they're all things that we just kind of say, Hey, this is who our dog is. Our dog is great. This is, you know, our dog is happy and playful and, and sweet and social and and all these things. But then if our dog turns into Cujo when it has a bone, oh, something must have happened to the dog.

Speaker 2: Why?

Speaker 2: Why? It's just a behavior just like the other behaviors. You are the one that's putting it in a category by itself and making it something different. But it's not, it's all just behavior and it's all just generated from within because that's who your dog is, right? And then mixed with that, they can also learn things which will then influence their behavior. But do you know how difficult it would be to actually teach a dog to guard a bone? That would actually be pretty difficult. The dog would have to display that behavior, at least to some extent, just naturally on its own.

10:00 — Resource guarding is difficult to teach because dogs must display some natural tendency before…

Speaker 2: And then you could nurture it, right? With positive reinforcement, which is what usually happens.

Speaker 2: Um, but dogs guard things because that's who they are. That's just what they do. Guarding things is a dog thing to do. Doesn't mean anything happened to your dog. Your dog's aggressive, your dog's reactive. It doesn't mean anything happened to your dog. Dogs do dog things. And that's what I told her. You know, why your dog guards? Because it's a dog <laugh>, because it's a dog. No, not all dogs do it, but it's in there with all dogs. It's in there. Just 'cause they don't do it doesn't mean it isn't in there, okay? And if you really truly internalize that fact, you will have a huge advantage over 99% of owners because your dog will never surprise you with anything that they do.

Speaker 2: So I think I know my dog pretty well. He's almost five years old. We've had him since he was less than a year old. Um, I know his behaviors, I know what he generally does day in and day out and how he responds to things. But if he decides to do something completely different tomorrow, I will not be surprised. I just won't because it's a dog. He's a dog, right? So we have some clients whose dogs have tried to, um, attack and kill other dogs. It's not because anything happened to them guys, that that is not what's going on here.

Speaker 2: It is because they're a dog. And that's just a thing dogs do. So, and I've had an episode before where I talked about dogs don't have a moral compass. They don't know good or bad. They are not innately good or bad. They are just dogs and all. Here's the thing, all dogs without training are just doing what comes naturally. And that's it. Do not overthink it. Do not overthink it.

Speaker 2: But also don't be naive enough to think that positive reinforcement only is going to be enough for you to move that needle. Because if you're trying to stop behaviors, which most people are when I meet them, you will not accomplish it that way. And I'm not saying that you can't achieve a different result ever. I'm just saying why would it stick? Why would it stick? There is no reason for that to stick. Nobody has put a roadblock in the dog's brain. Nobody has told the dog, don't do that behavior anymore. Doesn't work out for you.

13:00 — Stopping unwanted behavior requires something that clearly tells the dog not to repeat it.

Speaker 2: Don't do it For some reason. People are just hell bent on forever leaving that option on the table for the dog. They want to use treats to bribe, to lure, to beg their dog to do something different. But they refuse to do the thing that actually tells the dog, Hey, don't do that anymore.

Speaker 2: And then they say, my dog is stubborn. Oh no, they're not <laugh>. No, they're not. They're really not. Um, here's an example I have right now. And um, we have a chihuahua <laugh>. We have a chihuahua who, um, came in just a level 10, just out of his mind, anxious, whining, pacing, constant barking. The barking was the big thing. His owner couldn't take anymore resource guarding in certain situations. Um, just on wicked high alert in the car, wouldn't settle. Trying to get in her lap, barking out the window. Um, the car behavior was obnoxious. And two days into abor and train with us.

Speaker 2: Two days I get in the Jeep, he gets up in the seat next to me.

Speaker 2: I start the car, he lays down and curls up in a ball and he hangs out there the whole ride into the training center, which is a half an hour, little over a half an hour. And he is as good as gold. And there is only one reason that that happened. Do you know what it is? Punishment sounds so mean. I know, but I only had to do it once, right? We did it day one. I don't have to do it anymore. I don't, I don't have to do it. He's just good automatically. I don't even tell him to lay down.

Speaker 2: I require dogs to lay down in the car, but I don't even have to ask him to. He just does it on his own. And guess what? I share affection with him and the car and it's really enjoyable for the both of us. And he's just laying there and he is got soft eyes and he is relaxed. And I can reach over and I can give him a few pets on the head. I might even share a Dorito or two with him. <laugh>. And, uh, we're both really relaxed. It's, it's a nice ride.

Speaker 2: But I didn't achieve that with treatment. And his owner never would. She would never get there with that. And she didn't know that. That's why she's here, right? But this guy's four years old. He's been doing this for a while. Doesn't usually go away on its own. And there's nothing wrong with him, right? He had some bad behaviors, but there's nothing wrong with him. He's just a dog. He's doing what comes naturally. And nobody is inhibiting his behaviors. 'cause they didn't know how until now. They didn't know how until now and is absolutely necessary. Zeus is not stubborn.

Speaker 2: He gave it right up. He doesn't want any trouble. He adjusted his behavior super, super quickly. And a lot of dogs do. I have another client that started not that long ago with private sessions. Her dog was very reactive, barking and lunging and acting all a fool on the leash. And,

Speaker 2: And, um, two sessions in, three sessions in, she's taking 'em all over the place. They're going out on popular walking trails. She's going into PetSmart, she's stopping, she's talking to people. And you know what her dog does? He lays down, he lays down. He'll walk in a heel, he'll sit when she stops. And if she hangs out there long enough, he'll just lay down and he'll just wait for her. That wasn't achieved with treats. Now we use some treats in the training. We use some treats to teach the place command, the down command, even the heel command.

18:00 — A dog once difficult outdoors now heels, sits, and lies down while its owner…

Speaker 2: We use treats in the beginning, but they go away guys. They have to go away. And at some point you have to treat breaking a command just like any other unwanted behavior. And there has to be a correction for that. Otherwise, it just stays negotiable. And you have to be okay with that. So, and that's the thing about positive reinforcement only positive reinforcement is an extremely powerful tool. I never said that it wasn't. I just said it cannot inhibit a behavior. But it's a very powerful tool for building new behaviors. And so guess what often happens?

Speaker 2: We build behaviors we don't like with positive reinforcement.

Speaker 2: And that's kind of one of the, that's one of the funniest things about behaviors like reactivity. Aggression, anxiety is the first thought most humans will have is that something bad happened to the dog. That somebody did something bad to the dog. Um, and usually, usually those behaviors were nurtured. I'm not gonna say created because again, behavior kind of comes from within. Its genetic. But they were allowed to blossom. They were given room to grow and take root and become normal through the use of positive reinforcement. <laugh>, um, more bad behavior. Re positive reinforcement is responsible for more bad behavior than anything else besides genetic.

Speaker 2: A hundred percent, a hundred percent.

Speaker 2: We pet anxiety, we soothe fear, we feed reactivity, right? Dog barks, lunges does whatever they want the end of the leash. But then if they come back and look at us, we give him a treat. My husband sees it all the time. He goes into houses, he's working on pianos, keyboards, he'll go into the house, dog will bark and growl at him and immediately turn around to get his treat from the owner. So people think, oh my dog, I find I got his attention, he looked at me, I'm gonna feed that. And they think that they're helping, but they're not.

Speaker 2: So they're taking one of the most powerful tools and training that we have, and they're using it to make their dog worse. They don't know it. They don't know it. I know that a lot of people don't know that. And that is the fault of organizations that push lies eyes.

Speaker 2: Um, lots of international veterinary institutes, behavioral institutes, you know, people that say they, they know what they're doing and they know what they're talking about. And they don't, will tell you that you should not use punishment. And that you should always use, uh, rewards. Teach the dog what you want and they'll give you a boatload of reasons that are just complete crap. Um, and people make their dogs worse because they believe them. And why wouldn't they? Why wouldn't they? So I google the stuff occasionally just for kicks to see what the suggestions are. It's really a bad idea because it makes me super angry, <laugh>.

Speaker 2: But I'll do it. I'll Google it and I'll, I'll just, just for kicks just to see how many pages do I have to go before I find and answer that's even remotely, remotely close to accurate. And it's usually something like nine pages. I'll find one that starts to suggest maybe you need to, um, provide some negative consequences, <laugh>.

Speaker 2: And so it's no wonder people are stuck. It's no wonder they are, but their dogs are normal. There's not anything wrong with them. Um, and there's probably nothing wrong with your dogs either. Now there are dogs out there that are, um, not normal and I don't really like that word 'cause what does normal even really mean? But there are dogs out there, um, that their behaviors are so severe and their ability to create an inhibition is so poor that they're just not safe enough. Now, every dog is different and every family is different. So I always say, I always say, no dog is 100% safe.

Speaker 2: And so every family and every dog has to decide, is this dog safe enough to stay in my home? Right? So if you know they're not before training and then you get training, then post training, you need to make that decision. You need to make that assessment. Is this dog safe enough? Now with the skills and tools that we all have, um, because your dog will always be your dog, and we can try to change their behavior, but we'll never really change their personality. But most dogs can absolutely make better decisions. I wanna say something like 0.5% to 1%, but I really think it's, it's less than 1% of dogs that come through here.

24:00 — Most dogs can make better decisions without changing their personalities, while fewer than one…

Speaker 2: I just don't see a lot of hope for them. Um, it's probably closer to 1% if you consider the human part of the equation as well. So sometimes the dog is perfectly capable of learning, but there's just no way the person can do it. They're not willing or they're not able. Um, so we'll, we'll go with 1% of dogs that they're just, it's just not gonna work. But that's a pretty low percent. That's probably not you, <laugh>, you're probably not in that 1%. It's pretty rare. But just because your dog isn't modifying their behavior because you give them treats totally normal like that hopefully is good news to somebody out there.

Speaker 2: Um, you can't expect your dog to change their bad behaviors if you never tell them it's bad. Come on, people. <laugh>, come on. Uh, would you do that with your kids? Um, I shouldn't ask that because the answer for a lot of people is yes, they raise their kids the same way they're raising their dogs and it's complete chaos. That's it for today, guys. Thanks for listening. I look forward to the next one and, uh, have a happy thanksgiving. All right, I'll see y'all next time.