BH345: On Guard – Working Through Resource Guarding Issues

REMOTE POSITIVE INTERRUPTER

Some of you may remember the old ‘shaker can’ from years ago where it was recommended to shake the can full of rocks or pennies as an attempt to scare the dog enough that it would stop doing whatever it was doing that you didn’t like. Of course, that had the potential for major fallout since it was utilizing positive punishment. Thankfully we have figured out a much better way to interrupt our dog and change the emotion from fear or anger (using the words from Denise Fenzi’s recent webinar on training in the ‘wild’) to a more positive one.

One of the biggest concerns that I hear about the use of any type of reinforcement in this manner is that we will inadvertently be reinforcing the problem behavior. But that isn’t the way conditioning works! During this process we are changing the dogs’ emotions first and foremost, then with this process, we are also replacing the inappropriate behavior with a good, alternative one!

A ‘positive interrupter’ can be used to interrupt any type of behavior that might escalate into over arousal or conflict. This could be conflict between one dog and other dogs, cats, or over a resource. It can also be used to get a dog to come away from a dangerous situation or perhaps to even get them to drop something and come to you or go somewhere.

As mentioned before, by doing this, the word becomes a cue to eat a treat which therefore changes the dogs emotional state to a more positive one. You are NOT rewarding the negative behavior! You are interrupting and simply stopping its escalation and getting the dog out of one situation that is potentially negative or dangerous and into a happier state.

Teaching the positive interrupter starts with simple classical conditioning. You will start at the source of the treat or the location where you want your dog to go. Many people already have a ‘cookie jar’ or drawer or cabinet that already has an association with the dispensing of a treat. If you do, you can simply do a ‘cue transfer’ where the new word “Cookies” (you can use whatever word you want) means you are going to open the jar, drawer, or cabinet to get the treat and deliver it. You will gradually move away from the source of the treats and say the word, run to the jar/drawer/cabinet and open it and deliver the treat. If you don’t already have a sound that the dog recognizes, you can easily create one by saying the word, and delivering the treat. Do it in a way that is exciting for the dog. Maybe some clapping or with a high-pitched voice. You might be able to use a cue to go to their crate, or outside, or to their ‘place’ or even to squeak a toy which means to come to you to get it. Of course, this is only an option if your dog does not guard the toy, or space.

Here is a video compilation of me teaching it with food. Much like this video, you will want to start teaching it AND using it when you don’t really need it and there isn’t anything ‘bad’ going on that you really must interrupt.

Eventually the act of excitedly running to the source becomes part of the reinforcer.

This is a video of me working with a dog to teach the concept of going to the refrigerator to get ‘cheese’. It is narrated and you can see the dog is extremely focused on looking for her ball which is one of the things she guarded the most. It was almost a failure when she tried to jump up to get one of the toys high up.

If using the food/location interrupter and you have multiple dogs, it will be important to implement the ‘name modifier’ cue that we learned earlier along with the RPI cue. For example, “Cookies! – run to location – Name modifier cue – feed.” For now, work with one dog at a time, and ensure that they are going to a predictable location every time. For example, Dog A on the right, Dog B on the left!