Efficacy of a remote-controlled, positive-reinforcement, dog-training system for modifying problem behaviors exhibited when people arrive at the door

Using Principles from Applied Behaviour Analysis to Address an Undesired Behaviour: Functional Analysis and Treatment of Jumping Up in Companion Dogs

“…Jumping up on people is an undesired behaviour that companion dogs frequently display [58]. While being a nuisance behaviour for most owners, it can be potentially dangerous to vulnerable individuals, such as small children or elderly adults [58,59]. Various training approaches have been suggested for treating jumping up.…”

“…Various training approaches have been suggested for treating jumping up. For instance, stopping the dog from jumping by stepping on a lead [59], spraying the jumping dog with androstenone-infused water [60], or, more importantly, teaching alternative responses (e.g., sitting or lying on a mat) when a person enters the premises [58,61,62]. However, these training approaches have been put forward in absence of establishing the cause of jumping or, in an ABA context, without conducting a FBA prior to the onset of the intervention.…”

A review of medically unnecessary surgeries in dogs and cats

“…Common causes of undersirable barking include general anxiety, separation anxiety, and compulsive disorders, 57 and treatment by means of behavior modification with or without adjunctive medication should be attempted first. One study 58 found that positive reinforcement training was effective at reducing barking in response to someone knocking at the door, and dogs that are exercised more frequently are found to bark less than dogs that are not exercised. 59 While there appears to be general agreement within the veterinary behavior community that positive reinforcement is the most appropriate training method for dogs, barking is often treated through the use of methods that incorporate positive punishment.…”

Decreasing dog problem behavior with functional analysis: Linking diagnoses to treatment

“…Does this dog seem to do the behavior to upset or annoy you when you are not paying attention to him/her? (e.g., you are in another room or interacting with another person) (1) walking through the door served as a discriminative stimulus for the start of each condition, (2) as mentioned in the Introduction, a person entering through a door is one situation in which trainers focus on dogs that engage in the jumping up behavior (Bridwell, 2007;Pitcairn and Pitcairn, 2005;Yin et al, 2008). During the ignore condition, the experimenter entered the room but did not give any attention, make eye contact, speak to, or otherwise interact with the dog even if the dog jumped up.…”

“…For example, to decrease the dog problem behavior of jumping up on people, within the popular literature, there exist several common techniques, including kneeing the dog in the chest (Koehler, 1996;Pitcairn and Pitcairn, 2005), stepping on a leash to prevent the dog from jumping up (Bridwell, 2007;Lindsay, 2003), and teaching an alternative behavior (such as sitting or laying down) when coming through the door (Coren, 2004;Pitcairn and Pitcairn, 2005;Yin et al, 2008). However, all of these treatments have been proposed in the absence of a standard method with which to empirically diagnose the underlying maintaining variables for the jumping up behavior.…”