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I am perry!

@perry-88

she/her. autistic I am underage and I don't want any NSFW stuff featured on my blog! Multifandom. I'm new here. I REBLOG ALOT 🇵🇸
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ravynfyre

so many people do not understand that 1) animals are not people, and 2) they aren't teaching their animals what they THINK they are teaching them.

dog group on the book of faces, someone is asking for advice on how to get their dog to come to them after the dog is done relieving itself outside. The dog doesn't like coming to them an they spend ten or twenty minutes or more catching the dog each time to bring it in. Which reminded me of one of many attempts to talk a person through trying to fix exactly this same behavior in *many* other dogs over the years...

Me: So, a quick question for you... does the dog not coming to you and you having to chase them down frustrate you?

Them: Of course!

Me: So what do you do when you finally either catch the dog or get them to come to you?

Them: I give the dog a correction!

Me: So. You get hands on your dog and then you immediately punish them for allowing you to get hands on them. And you wonder why your dog has developed the habit of not coming to you?

Them: No, that's not... I'm punishing them for not coming when I call!

Me: Which was.... fifteen minutes ago, or so, you said?

Them: Yes, when I first called them!

Me: Dogs brains literally cannot link an abstract thought like that. A thought and a consequence MUST happen within 2.4 seconds of one another, or the consequence becomes linked to the most recent behavior, thought, or activity. So, tell me... how is your dog supposed to understand that you punishing them is for the event fifteen minutes ago when you have made such a concerted, if unintentional, effort to teach them that them getting close enough for you to lay hands on them in the yard means an immediate punishment?

Them: But that's not what I *meant*!

Me: Doesn't matter what YOU meant... what THEY learned is that they come to you, and they get punished. Stop punishing your dog for the behavior that you want to see more of.

Stop anthropomorphizing your animals, folks. They don't think like us. Stop setting them - and yourself - up for failure.

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perry-88

Wow!