Mom Vs. Dad

[Guest Houston1219]

Does anyone else feel that the "dad says no, go ask mom" mind trick happens with their grey? Lol BF says I'm just too nice, and he is probably right, but I'm pretty sure Huston exploits this.

 

Example: (cooking dinner and said pooch is underfoot)

 

Mat: Go lay down

Houston: on his bed laying quietly before I can turn my head

 

Me: Go lay down

Houston: blank stare

Me: Go lay down!

Huston: takes two steps down hallway, stops, looks over his shoulder, "are you suuuure mom?"

Me: Go!

Houston: tries the adorable eyes (which almost work!)

Me: Don't make me go get dad!

Houston: finally lies down

 

What gives? Anybody else with me?

[Sambuca]

It's just me, but I've seen this often. You don't enforce what you say often enough. Sailor loves doing tricks for treats for me. When out, he's learned that if someone else asks him to do something he can stare at them for a bit and he'll get his treats anyway. People think he's cute so they don't wait him out. It drives me batty!

My suggestion is if you want him to lay on his bed the first time you ask, ask him, then if doesn't listen gently garb his collar and bring him to the bed. He'll learn you mean business.

[krissy]

I say something, it happens. DBF says something and the dogs generally try to figure out what's in it for them first. He does zero training with them. He asks them to sit every once in a blue moon and gives a treat. Of course they don't listen to him! Lol

[kudzu]

I say something, it happens. DBF says something and the dogs generally try to figure out what's in it for them first. He does zero training with them. He asks them to sit every once in a blue moon and gives a treat. Of course they don't listen to him! Lol

Ditto! Same applies to the cats, both mine & his. He's always shocked when the cats come when I call them. Dogs are plenty smart enough to know who gives commands & who gives requests. In our home it isn't related to a stern tone of voice. It has everything to do with consistency & repetition.

[sarabz]

Yep - Bella listens to me because I've worked with her and am persistent and don't just let her not do things. DH gets frustrated and gives up if she doesn't respond immediately but since he's rarely been persistent she rarely responds.

[NeylasMom]

Only me here, but the keys to success to get the behaviors you want are to communicate clearly to your dog what you want him to do and then reinforce heavily when he does. Sounds like your cue for "go lay down" has become "go lay down, go lay down, go, don't make me get dad".

[GreytNut]

Yes, absolutely, but it's the other way around. I tend to be the disciplinarian and DH is very lax with him. Then he wonders why Riley listens when I tell him to do something, but just stands there when he tells him to so the same thing.

 

I think the difference is tone of voice and intention. If you tell your dog to do something in a voice that says, "You will do this thing and I expect nothing else" and if there are immediate consequences for not doing this thing, i.e. getting grabbed by the collar, frog-marched off to bed and told very sternly to lie down, your dog will listen. If you tell him to do something in a voice that says, "You will do this thing but only if you feel like it, and I hope I don't sound too bossy," your dog will not listen to you. It is important that YOU follow through, not your BF. Otherwise you're reinforcing the idea that he doesn't have to listen to you, he only has to listen to your BF.

 

DH struggles with it too. I know he finds it frustrating. He just needs to find the Voice of Authority. He'll get there with practice, and so will you.

 

ETA: I'm assuming you are clearly asking things of your dog that he already knows the commands for, and that he's willfully choosing to disobey rather than simply not understanding what you want from him.

Edited April 26, 2014 by GreytNut

[krissy]

Yes, absolutely, but it's the other way around. I tend to be the disciplinarian and DH is very lax with him. Then he wonders why Riley listens when I tell him to do something, but just stands there when he tells him to so the same thing.

 

I think the difference is tone of voice and intention. If you tell your dog to do something in a voice that says, "You will do this thing and I expect nothing else" and if there are immediate consequences for not doing this thing, i.e. getting grabbed by the collar, frog-marched off to bed and told very sternly to lie down, your dog will listen. If you tell him to do something in a voice that says, "You will do this thing but only if you feel like it, and I hope I don't sound too bossy," your dog will not listen to you. It is important that YOU follow through, not your BF. Otherwise you're reinforcing the idea that he doesn't have to listen to you, he only has to listen to your BF.

 

DH struggles with it too. I know he finds it frustrating. He just needs to find the Voice of Authority. He'll get there with practice, and so will you.

 

ETA: I'm assuming you are clearly asking things of your dog that he already knows the commands for, and that he's willfully choosing to disobey rather than simply not understanding what you want from him.

I will disagree just a bit. Tone has nothing to do with it in my opinion. DBF often sounds a lot more "no nonsense" than I do. I often sound laid back and playful, and my dogs respond best that way. When I do recalls it is generally in a high pitched "sing song" tone. Hardly the voice of authority. And yet the dogs come racing to me. They respond quickly not because I have drilled into them that they "must" but because I have turned my criteria (must) into their motivator (want to). The respond because they understand that doing so nets them something rewarding... food, a toy, playtime, praise, a chin scratch. This has happened enough that there no longer needs to be a reward every single time.

 

Turning on the "voice of authority" will get you nowhere. There is no special voice in training. There is just reward and consistency. And my personal opinion is that happy and playful gets you a lot further than sternness in dog training.

[kudzu]

And my personal opinion is that happy and playful gets you a lot further than sternness in dog training.

[GreytNut]

I will disagree just a bit. Tone has nothing to do with it in my opinion. DBF often sounds a lot more "no nonsense" than I do. I often sound laid back and playful, and my dogs respond best that way. When I do recalls it is generally in a high pitched "sing song" tone. Hardly the voice of authority. And yet the dogs come racing to me. They respond quickly not because I have drilled into them that they "must" but because I have turned my criteria (must) into their motivator (want to). The respond because they understand that doing so nets them something rewarding... food, a toy, playtime, praise, a chin scratch. This has happened enough that there no longer needs to be a reward every single time.

 

Turning on the "voice of authority" will get you nowhere. There is no special voice in training. There is just reward and consistency. And my personal opinion is that happy and playful gets you a lot further than sternness in dog training.

 

Do you use the same tone of voice to give commands that you do to call, or to praise? I might have been taught old school methods, but I always thought that you use a happy sing-song voice to call your dog to you (which I do, and for the same reason you do, and to excellent effect) and also to praise. But you use a no-nonsense tone to give a command, i.e. go to your bed. If you don't get a response you use a sharp tone to get your dog's attention. Responding to your command gets praise (in the sing-song voice) and not responding gets correction i.e., getting marched off to bed. I'm certainly not advocating that the OP yell and snarl at her dog, but I would think that using the same tone to command that you do to call or praise would confuse a dog.

 

As an experiment to see if tone really does matter I tried getting Riley to sit in the same sing-song tone I use to call / praise him. Crickets chirped. Tried it again. Nope. Tried asking "Sit?" as if it were a question. No go. Told him to sit in the usual command voice. He sat. Obviously what you're doing works very well for your hounds because you've done a lot of advanced training with them, but Riley just gave me a blank stare like I was speaking in Swahili. So now I'm confused.

[Guest rarmstrong]

 

Do you use the same tone of voice to give commands that you do to call, or to praise? I might have been taught old school methods, but I always thought that you use a happy sing-song voice to call your dog to you (which I do, and for the same reason you do, and to excellent effect) and also to praise. But you use a no-nonsense tone to give a command, i.e. go to your bed. If you don't get a response you use a sharp tone to get your dog's attention. Responding to your command gets praise (in the sing-song voice) and not responding gets correction i.e., getting marched off to bed. I'm certainly not advocating that the OP yell and snarl at her dog, but I would think that using the same tone to command that you do to call or praise would confuse a dog.

 

As an experiment to see if tone really does matter I tried getting Riley to sit in the same sing-song tone I use to call / praise him. Crickets chirped. Tried it again. Nope. Tried asking "Sit?" as if it were a question. No go. Told him to sit in the usual command voice. He sat. Obviously what you're doing works very well for your hounds because you've done a lot of advanced training with them, but Riley just gave me a blank stare like I was speaking in Swahili. So now I'm confused.

We have little inclination as to what Riley may be attending to. From what I've learned, sound (particularly in reference to training) is not what dogs pick up on quickly or efficiently. Riley may be picking up on subtle changes in your body/face to indicate your SD rather than the tone of your voice. I think of the kiddos I work with all the time. Many kids with Autism lack verbal skills and are keyed into to everything except for what I'm saying. We video ourselves and run all kinds of distractor trials to ensure that we are actually teaching the response to the correct SD, not shaping up a faulty SD such as always asking for the skill at the table, or accidentally moving our face a certain way, looking at the correct answer, asking for the skill in the basement only etc

 

So, perhaps there is something in your face or posture that is actually indicating to Riley the command, not the tone of your voice.

Edited April 27, 2014 by rarmstrong

[NeylasMom]

 

Do you use the same tone of voice to give commands that you do to call, or to praise? I might have been taught old school methods, but I always thought that you use a happy sing-song voice to call your dog to you (which I do, and for the same reason you do, and to excellent effect) and also to praise. But you use a no-nonsense tone to give a command, i.e. go to your bed. If you don't get a response you use a sharp tone to get your dog's attention. Responding to your command gets praise (in the sing-song voice) and not responding gets correction i.e., getting marched off to bed. I'm certainly not advocating that the OP yell and snarl at her dog, but I would think that using the same tone to command that you do to call or praise would confuse a dog.

 

As an experiment to see if tone really does matter I tried getting Riley to sit in the same sing-song tone I use to call / praise him. Crickets chirped. Tried it again. Nope. Tried asking "Sit?" as if it were a question. No go. Told him to sit in the usual command voice. He sat. Obviously what you're doing works very well for your hounds because you've done a lot of advanced training with them, but Riley just gave me a blank stare like I was speaking in Swahili. So now I'm confused.

If you trained the *cue* (command is an old school term ) using a stern voice then that's what your dog is going to respond to. If you train it using a happy voice your dog will respond to that. Dogs don't speak English, they're just learning to associate a behavior with a given word or some sort of body language. If you want the dog to respond you have to be consistent so just switching up the way you give the cue like what you did of course won't work.

 

We say all our cues in a happy voice here. I'm happy to post some short video clips if you want to see them responding to some of them.

[NeylasMom]

Eta: If you really want to test it out, do this. Pick a very strong cue, I'll use sit as an example. Give the new cue (sit in a happy voice) followed immediately by the old cue (sit in a stern voice) 3-4 times in quick succession. Every time your dogs sits, immediately praise (happy) and feed. On the next rep, say sit in your happy voice, then wait for her to sit. Count to 5. If she sits, praise and feed. If she doesn't, give the stern sit cue and just praise when she sits. Then try again, counting to 5. If she's having trouble catching on, go back and do a couple of the initial reps with both cues, then try again. This is the way you'd switch cues, or switch from a hand signal to a verbal. If this is confusing I can post video of this as well.

[sobesmom]

Every animal interacts differently with every person. They're smart. If you want to change how the dog reacts to your commands - you need to work on that. And - it might not be you doing it exactly the same as your DH - just in a way the gets you the results you want.

 

My Diana will "beg" when my DH is eating in bed or on the couch. She'll stand there - watching - waiting for a tidbit to come her way - because he does that. She wouldn't consider doing that to me or DD. We don't like or tolerate that behavior - and we certainly won't feed her. Diana modifies her behavior to the person involved, and honestly - not a biggie. I don't love that my DH does this - but as long as it doesn't impact the way the dogs acts around ME - I don't care.

 

As long as everyone gets the behavior they expect - it's all good.

[GreytNut]

If you trained the *cue* (command is an old school term ) using a stern voice then that's what your dog is going to respond to. If you train it using a happy voice your dog will respond to that. Dogs don't speak English, they're just learning to associate a behavior with a given word or some sort of body language. If you want the dog to respond you have to be consistent so just switching up the way you give the cue like what you did of course won't work.

 

We say all our cues in a happy voice here. I'm happy to post some short video clips if you want to see them responding to some of them.

 

This sounds like it will be as much of a retraining of the human as a retraining of the dog.

[a_daerr]

Oh yeah!!

 

After Hen lost his leg, I gradually started making him re-learn stairs and jumping up into the car. Once he learned, that was the end of that, and I stopped lifting him. If I'm around, he goes up with no problem. But if it's just DBF, Henry stands there looking pathetic and waiting to be lifted. He knows who he can get over on and who he can't.

 

Dogs are much smarter than we give them credit for!

[Guest Houston1219]

I'm beginning to wonder if hand signals would work better in our situation. He is not always (70%) with a verbal sit, but on the ninety percent range with the visual cute taught in class. We are currently working on a visual for down that doesn't involve physically touching the floor as it's rather inconvenient for obvious reasons. Maybe I need to think up one for "go lay down" and work on that next. I don't like having to use stern sounding "commands." I need to figure out a strategy for turning so-so verbal cues into visuals... Tips?

 

P.s. Videos would be very helpful!

Edited April 30, 2014 by Houston1219

[krissy]

I'm beginning to wonder if hand signals would work better in our situation. He is not always (70%) with a verbal sit, but on the ninety percent range with the visual cute taught in class. We are currently working on a visual for down that doesn't involve physically touching the floor as it's rather inconvenient for obvious reasons. Maybe I need to think up one for "go lay down" and work on that next. I don't like having to use stern sounding "commands." I need to figure out a strategy for turning so-so verbal cues into visuals... Tips?

P.s. Videos would be very helpful!

Dogs typically respond better to visual cues than verbal. Some dogs are better at verbal than others. Kili is alright, Summit is pretty awful. Lol. He has a tougher time switching from the visual to verbal (since generally you are teaching with a visual cue first until you get a reliable response and then starting to add the verbal cue.

 

In almost all my videos I am using a happy voice when giving cues. In real life... if I get frustrated I might get a little sharp but I try not to let that happen. It's important to evaluate why your dog may not be responding rather than getting "stern" (easier said than done sometimes!).

[sobesmom]

I'm beginning to wonder if hand signals would work better in our situation. He is not always (70%) with a verbal sit, but on the ninety percent range with the visual cute taught in class. We are currently working on a visual for down that doesn't involve physically touching the floor as it's rather inconvenient for obvious reasons. Maybe I need to think up one for "go lay down" and work on that next. I don't like having to use stern sounding "commands." I need to figure out a strategy for turning so-so verbal cues into visuals... Tips?

 

P.s. Videos would be very helpful!

I'm NO trainer. The only commands my dogs have ever known are ones that are practical to daily living in my house. But - I talk with my hands naturally, so hand signals have always gone along with training. And - I never want to be "that lady" that's bellowing at her kids or dogs - so I might clap or make a kissy-noise (I can't whistle) to get attention - then do a hand signal.

 

I think that you might be right that if your verbal commands aren't getting the results you want - hand signals might be more effective. There's much less "tone" in hand-signals to be misinterpreted.

 

I can hand-signal Diana (and previously Sobe) to come here (not a "true" come per say, but a "get over here"), back up (useful in a small house), leave the room, get off furniture, stop walking and stand still, and get away from that person you're bugging. It's all just stuff that evolved naturally - I certainly had no plan. But it IS cool when we go to the vet's office - and to get on the scale - I wiggle my fingers and Diana steps into the scale - I hold up my "stop" hand - and she stops - they get the weight - and I point - and Diana proceeds into the exam room. I had one vet tech tell me "I have NO IDEA what the heck THAT was - but it sure works!" I told her - I don't know how to train dogs - so - I winged it! She told me that many "trained dogs" had to hear "come -- come - come - sit - sit sit - sit " and then get muscled into staying on the scales.

 

Sometimes - just doing what works - works.

 

(OK - now I'll duck and cover - because A LOT of people on here are REALLY REALLY knowledgeable trainers.)

[NeylasMom]

The bottom line is that how well your dog responds to a cue relies on how well you've trained it. It shouldn't matter whether it's a verbal cue or a physical cue, although I will give the caveats that one, dogs do communicate primarily with body language so I think visual cues can be a bit easier and two, a large hand signal, like motioning your hand downward to ask him to lie down is often a more "universal" cue than a verbal cue which can vary drastically depending on how the given person says it (tone of voice, inflection, volume, etc.).

 

But ultimately, if you want your dog to respond to any given cue, you need to train it properly. Some key things to keep in mind:

- When you're initially training the behavior, you shouldn't even be saying the cue. You put the cue in when you have taught the dog the behavior and he's doing it consistently. There are exceptions to this, but generally speaking, for basic behaviors like sit, down, etc. the cue is only added when the dog is performing the behavior

- You give the cue ONCE and only ONCE and then you wait the dog out. This means that if the dog isn't completely reliable on a behavior yet, you're working with the dog on leash, you're giving your dog your undivided attention, etc., you're not just letting him wander off to find better things to do.

- If your dog does what you ask, you reinforce him. You should fade out luring very quickly so it doesn't turn into a bribe and you can switch from food as the main reinforcer to play or praise (how often if at all depends a lot on what your dog actually finds reinforcing), but if you want a behavior to stay strong, you need to consistently reinforce it. And do it proportionally to how difficult the behavior is. If you ask your dog to come to you rather than chase a rabbit in the yard and he does you better not reward with the same exact thing as what you'd reward with after you ask your dog to sit for the 6337th time and he does.

 

The best way to improve your skills as a trainer is to enroll in a basic obedience class with a skilled PR trainer. IMHO a good trainer will train using food as the primary reinforcer, will use a marker of some sort (clicker or other verbal marker like "yes"), and will teach behaviors through some combination of shaping, luring, and capturing. Some negative punishment is fine, but trainers who use or are even okay with choke/prong/shock collars, use punishment or corrections, or otherwise make you uncomfortable should be avoided.

 

To the OP, I will try to get some video for you and post it soon. Even though my dogs already know it, I might be able to do a video to show the steps we use to teach a down in the classes at the school where I'm assisting/teaching, or I may be able to convince someone to video me working with one of the dogs at the school.

[Fruitycake]

Even with hand signals, it is possible to have different people's gestures mean different things. One of our dogs is trained to sit and to lie down to one set of gesture commands with my husband and another with me. (I never did like the accepted gesture for sit that he uses, horizontal hand over the dog's head, so I point to the part of her body I want on the ground and point at her back end = sit, front (or in front of her) = lie down - and yes, I can even get her to do them alternating by pointing at her back end when she's lying down and she sits back up.) But if I try his gesture she looks like she's trying to figure it out and doesn't quite get what I'm saying, and when my husband points at the floor or near her front paws she gets up and starts sniffing for the (imaginary) piece of food that must be on the floor!