Recent Articles

Developing Separation Anxiety: Will the Learn to Earn Program Cause Separation Anxiety in my Puppy?

November 14, 2012

Question: I have had my new puppy for a couple of days now, and I have had her at my side nearly all the time, whether tethered directly to me or to a piece of furniture near me, so I can keep an eye on her as Dr. Yin suggested in Perfect Puppy in 7 Days. However, this seems to have resulted in my puppy becoming EXTREMELY attached to me, because we are always together. Unless she takes a nap and I put her in her crate, or it’s nighttime and she is in the crate, we’re not separated at all.

The Birth of Animal Behavior and Training as a Science Part 3: Along Comes B.F. Skinner

November 7, 2012

Virtually everyone who trains animals knows the name B.F. Skinner. Burrhus Frederic Skinner (1904–1980) is one of the best-known psychologists in history. His claim to fame is the Skinner Box—a more-refined version of Thorndike’s puzzle box. The box had a lever, a slot for food rewards, and water. The rat could explore and if it happened to press the bar a food pellet would drop into the tray. The cage was wired to automatically record behavior showing the cumulative number of presses per minute. Similar boxes were made for pigeons. Due to this efficient way for testing rats and pigeons

The Birth of Animal Behavior and Training as a Science Part 2: Behavior in it’s Infancy

October 31, 2012

While animal behavior was struggling to become a science, researches, one by one, inched their way closer. One of the first was Ivan Pavlov. Ivan Pavlov (1849–1936) In the early 1900s, the Russian physiologist, Ivan Pavlov, was studying digestion in dogs. Pavlov designed and surgically implanted a fistula, which allowed him to measure and analyze gastric secretions after feeding his canine test subjects. His findings from this research eventually won him a Nobel Prize in medicine, which later attributed to his prestigious standing in Russia and among the Academy of Sciences. However, during the course of his research, Pavlov observed

The Birth of Animal Behavior and Training as a Science Part 1: Before Behavior Became a Science

October 31, 2012

From dog trainers on TV to professional sport trainers to the casual pet dog trainer, the range of skill and the types of techniques used, even within a given level field, varies as much as the faces of the people carrying the techniques out. What doesn’t change though is the fact that animal training and our study of behavior has changed dramatically from fanciful anecdotes into a mature science in the last 200 years. The following 5-part series journeys back to the beginning and highlights some of the most incredible and significant stages that have shaped the field today. Animal

My First Day in New Zealand

October 12, 2012

Well, I’m in New Zealand prior to my set of lectures in Auckland, Massey University, and Dunedin. After a little over a day, here’s what I can say. 1. New Zealand Airlines is the best airline I’ve taken so far. The flight was over 13 hours but it didn’t seem long at all! 2. There are sheep in the middle of Auckland.       New Zealand      Ok. That’s a little misleading. They live in a big park. But they wander around wherever they want and people just drive slowly. The park is Cornwall Park.      New Zealand  

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