does a force that compels always have to be a physical correction?

as far as genetic predisposition to bite the ball etc, could "drive" or the genetic predisposition be the force that compels a dog to do something?
i think so.
i also think that if you look up repetitive compulsion and do the research we might find that habits and repetition are some of the hardest things to break, in those cases doing anything else in those specific situations create anxiety and uneasyness, same thing that happens when a dog experiences something other than what it is expected or has repeated over and over.

as far as my dog lying in the same place outside, i believe that there is some "force" (not physical) that compels him to lie there.

i wonder what armin would say about compulsion? i wonder if he would limit it to only physical corrections? ill check around for more documentation on other's views.

ultimately john, we think the same way about how a dog should be trained (based on the little we have shared) its more of the definition and theory where we differ. all of that aside, i use force in many situations, as we all do, and a ton motivation in different situations. i guess that is what is so great about the sport is that we really dont know what compels the dogs to act certain ways (especially when we are talking about tracking since we cant possibly comprehend how sensitive a dog's nose is)

i guess i am convinced that conditioning in a dog that is very strong can eventually become compulsive. in other words there are some types of conditioning that are so strong that when a stimulus doesnt yield the result, the dog is full of anxiety, and is only comfortable if it does, i could be wrong, but someone would have to convince me of it, and i am open. however the talk of the continuim of motivation and pure force is not where the confusion lies, for i understand the basics involved with the environment including primary, secondary, and tertiary motivators along with both positive and negative reinforcement.

it would be cool if we all lived in the same general area, nobody around here thinks this deeply into dog training...

 Quote:

as far as genetic predisposition to bite the ball etc, could "drive" or the genetic predisposition be the force that compels a dog to do something?
i think so.

 Quote:

as far as my dog lying in the same place outside, i believe that there is some "force" (not physical) that compels him to lie there.

Travis,

In these two examples, you are not teaching the dog to do anything. This is my point. This topic started about a training methodology. What you seem to be talking about is observation of impulsive/compulsive/innate behavior of a dog. I'm not disputing that 'drive' or 'genetic predisposition' are compelling forces, but those are what the dog brings to the table (these we have little control over beyond our initial selection proces). What we as the trainer have to bring to the table are the methods, strategy & techniques to manipulate the dog to do what we want.

I'm not sure how else to explain my position, so maybe we just have to agree to disagree.....it's been interesting.....

Pat,
I'm going to review my notes from all the Flinks seminars that I've attended and post a reply within a day or two ( sorry, I just moved last week and I'm still unpacking....uggg )

thanks will, i will be keeping an eye on this thread for your response.

Dear John,
I apologize for not answering your question in your post sooner.I do not know how I missed your post, anyway now I found it.
First I would like to talk about the subject "drive,compulsion,drive" . Most of the time drive,compulsion,drive is used and I believe when Bernhard talks about drive,compulsion,drive in the obedience specifically in the heeling,when the dog is losing focus or losing some drive.
Probably tomorrow I will call Bernhard and after I talk with him I will post his answer.
At the seminar I hosted with Bernhard the subject was brought up by one of the ladies that attended the seminar in the mean time she was watching me in the field heeling a young Malinois that was 18 months old with an incredible drive ,his name was Chucky.
I say was because I just sold him and I miss him.
I was heeling Chucky and I wanted to put some pressure so what I did I heeled Chucky close to the bench area where everybody was sitting and for a fraction of a second he lost focus on me and looked towards Bernhard ( Bernhard was clapping his hands on purpose to create the distracting situation for the dog). What I did was apply 3 fast,soft jerks to the leash attatched to the prong collar.
And one of the ladies she asked Bernhard what I was doing when I did the 3 jerks and Bernhard explained to her that was the perfect way to apply drive,compulsion,drive.
So he asked me to pass by again in front of the benches heeling Chucky and this time he put up his leg and I had to heel Chucky over his legs ,so I did this.
This was the first time Chucky was doing this type of exercise and both of us knew that Chucky would lose his focus on me so I could show again how to apply compulsion.
So we did it and like we knew Chucky did lose his focus so I reapplied the 3 fast,soft jerks and Chucky immediatley responded positively getting his focus back on me and that was when he received his reward.
So we did repeat this exercise several times to the point Chucky never had a problem to go over his legs like Bernhard was not there never losing focus on me.
So that is when the subject drive,compulsion,drive was brought up.
That is why I said in all of my posts "that is what I believe Bernhard meant when he said drive,compulsion,drive" ,because most of the time he was using me on the field as an example with one of my dogs to show different techniques being applied.
Bernhard he was asking me to show the people at the seminar how I was training my dogs for different Schutzhund exercises or how to correct or when to reward and how I applied compulsion.
I believe Bernhard and I have almost the same method of training and share the same philosophies and that is why he wanted me to show my techniques at the seminar. And that is why at the same time Bernhard showed me some of his new techniques that I will for sure incorporate into my bag of training.And I showed to him some of my techniques that I know he has already included into his daily training program.

Regards,
Francesco Carotenuto

http://www.K9Nation1.com

Will,
I know you are in the middle of unpacking. If you have the chance can you read my post to John? Do you remember what Bernhard was explaining about drive,compulsion,drive when I was doing my exercise with Chucky?
Take care and don't kill yourself with the move to the new house. Regards, Francesco Carotenuto

http://www.K9Nation1.com

francesco, i understand completely what you were doing with chucky and what you were hoping to achieve. you were proofing the dog, but you were actually setting him up to make a mistake and then correct him "after" he did it. this showed him what you don't what him to do. this is absolutely a necessary part of training especially before trials and for dogs going into real life situations. training for all possible scenarios. i agree with this 100% so please don't think i am arguing the suitability of this excercise. it is necessary and it is appropriate, but......... it is not an illustration of the technique i was discussing.
what i was trying to get more info on is how to "prevent" the dog from making a mistake in the first place. proofing and setting the dog up for errors will come later. to me, and maybe i am wrong, the big difference between compulsion and correction is when it takes place. compulsion takes place in conjunction with the command and actually forces the dog to be correct. correction takes place after the dog has already made a mistake. i don't believe you could have used the kind of compulsion i am talking about in the excercise with chucky. that kind of excercise pretty much has to be done exactly as you did it. in order to be the same thing as i am talking about, you would have applied some kind of reinforcement at the same time as the command that would have prevented him from making a mistake in the first place. then when he did it correctly, you would have praised him to show him that was indeed what you expected. it would have been very difficult, if not impossible, to prevent an error in that excercise. as i said, that one had to be done as you did it. i do think there are a lot of things that can be taught by preventing errors and then giving praise and rewards for correctness. these are the things i am trying to discover.
you see, i am not sure i completely understand flink's meaning in "drive, compulsion, drive." it could be that he includes both "compulsion and correction" in his meaning. one being applied with the command and the other after the error. since both are useful and necessary, it could be that he doesn't make a distinction between the two. i am just attempting to make clear here that i am looking for tips, advice, discussion, anecdotes on the type of compulsion that comes in conjunction with the command; the kind that prevents errors from happening; that shows the dog what i want rather than allowing a mistake and then having to correct for it. personally, i don't want to be so dependent on corrections for communicating with my dog. i have done that in the past, because i was told to, but i am hoping i can get past that and be a little more creative and a lot more positive. i am not a big competitor and never will be. i like having a good time with the dogs, being social with other folks of like mind, and getting some healthy excercise and fresh air. i want training to be pleasant for me and the dog. that's why i am looking for something that will insure the dog is correct, so there will not be so much need for corrections.
this has been a really good discussion so far. i'm hoping that someone who has an inside track with flinks will be able to shed some light on his meaning of "drive, compulsion, drive."
thanks

Hi Francesco and Patricia. This discussion is getting mighty technical for my level of "novicity" - but I find it very interesting as we had a similar demonstration in training last Saturday, specifically referencing Bernhard's methods. And it involved "securing" (my word) heeling correctly through distraction - in drive - including a bit of compulsion - with a higher level of drive as the result. So I hope both of you will bear with me - I'm trying to learn too.

The exercise in a nutshell was 1) work the dog up into good "drive" mode. 2) begin heeling 3) heel very close to our trainer Dave (also the helper here, and wearing his helper pants at the time) plus a "gallery" behind him 4) correct if dog looks away, reward WHEN dog regains eye contact. 5) Repeat.

The first level of distraction was Dave just standing there, with all of us standing right behind him.

Level next was Dave clapping right with the dog got to him.

Level next was when Dave started clapping, all of us did too - and we all stopped when he did.

The dog being tested on this (and Dave was making a broader point to the whole group, but I won't get further into that) was our recent SchH1 female. Dave has only worked with her a few times. So he's still "learning" her - and also working with a new and novice handler on her.

The first time they heeled on by, the dog was on a loose leash (with flat leather collar, but that could differ by dog). She looked towards the distraction, the handler (newbie) missed the correction opportunity, was told keep on going - you're too late!.

Do it again.

Team comes by again. Dave claps, dog breifly takes eyes off handlers face - gets mild correction - looks back at handler - they move on.

Critique. Correction not very meaningful to dog. (remember, we're talking a flat, small leather collar here - give a MEANINGFUL pop!)

Again, team heels by, Dave claps, dog is getting it and does a FAST head check to noise. But novice handler catches it in time, corrects, dog's eyes FLY back to handler's eyes. Not enough praise though - Dave coaches quickly.

We do it again. Dog is now paying massive attention to newbie handler. Won't take eyes off of handler. Dave claps, dog looks even MORE active and bouncy in the heeling paying complete attention to newbie handler. DON'T STOP! COME AROUND AGAIN! OK, NOW EVERYONE CLAP WHEN I DO! Dog/handler come around again. MORE distraction. MORE focus on the handler from the dog.

Bottom line - setting this dog up for a small failure in this situation (read, and set up well, and with appropriate timing by the trainer) set us up to BUILD MORE drive in the heeling.

Once Gary gets better as a handler, she could probably get ONE meaningful correction under those circumstances, and then never take her eyes off of him through lots more work.

So I think an important point (using typing) is drive, compulsion, DRIVE!!. Kimba did very well in her first time with Dave through that exercise, mainly because her trainer who took her to SchH1 is excellent, particularly in OB work - and because Dave is really good too. But I can see how that exercise will happen many more times here (with dogs getting better at it each time) with the RESULT being more confident dogs. Kimba learned that her "safe, confident, fun, rewarded" place was being in the proper heeling position staring at Gary's face. Anything else on the field was just not as exciting or rewarding.

Patricia, my point to you is to attempt to explain that yes, we WERE setting this dog up to fail - and we weren't totally sure how badly she would fail. I trust my trainer, and I know if she failed REALLY bad the first time around, the exercise would have gone totally different. BUT...due to her SLIGHT failures, the opportunity was created to shore up and reinforce the right way to heel.

She has been more secure and confident with this in her subsequent practice sessions.

Francesco, Patricia and others..., I'm really interested in your feedback on this - I'm hoping that I'm understanding the concepts correctly.

Thanks,
Beth

Dear Patricia,
It has been a long time thatI have wanted to reply to you and I am now able to do so.
Probably you did not pay close attention to the prevoius post I have posted on this topic. At the same time from what I have read in your last post on this discussion I see that you have an idea but you are still a bit confused on the subject. Like you say you want to use compulsion to prevent a mistake. In the exercise we did with Chucky I never corrected him like you said ,I used really light jerks on the leash and that is compulsion. I never gave to him a hard jerk, that would be a correction. Yes me and Bernhard set up Chucky to make a mistake so we could have seen his reaction to the set-up. So the first time I passed Bernhard I did not yet know how Chucky was going to respond to the exercise. When I was heeling Chucky close to Bernhard, he was 100% percent focused on me in high level drive to the point I was passing next to Bernhard and that is when Bernhard created the distraction, he responded to the distraction looking at him. So what I did to him to bring him back to high level drive I applied compulsion (light jerks) not hard jerks(correction) and that is where I believe you are getting confused. We set-up the same exercise again and this time I know exactly what Chucky's response will be so what i did a couple of paces before I reached Bernhard I applied some compulsion(light jerks), like you say to prevent the mistake. And Chucky he reponded in the proper way , he was not distracted by Bernhard and his focus stayed on me.
One more thing I would like to say to you.If you are looking to have fun with your dog definately compulsion is not fun for your dog already the meaning ofcompulsion for anyone equals no fun.
Regards,
Francesco Carotenuto

http://www.K9Nation1.com

Dear Beth,
I apologize to you as well for not replying sooner.Let me see if I could help you right now. The exercise you did with David and your female is correct to one point.Let me explain.
Like I said to Patricia you have to set-up some type of scenario to see how your dog will respond to that specific exercise. So you know the second time you set up that same scenario you know how your dog will respond. You do this to be fair to the dog because the first time you are not yet sure how he will respond so you can not apply compulsion or correction because you do not know if you need to. The second time around with the same exercise you know how your dog will respond and this time you will be ready to apply the compulsion or correction depending on the scenario.So when I say to you that you are almost correct I meant this :The scenario created is correct the only thing you should be doing differently like I did with Chucky the second time I did the exercise I was ready to apply the compulsion. This time I applied the compulsion a few steps before we reached the distraction, preventing him to make the mistake.
So what i am saying to you don't wait for the dog to be distracted and then apply compulsion, apply the compulsion before the distraction. And after you pass the distraction,reward your dog immediately.That's the only difference I would apply to your exercise. Please let me know if this helps you.
Sincerely,
Francesco Carotenuto

http://www.K9Nation1.com