It’s Shocking!
By Lisa Ellman
I saw a post on another trainer’s page that said the e collar is a game changer. Well, you can’t dispute that. In case you were unaware, what is now called an “ e collar” used to be called a shock collar, but I think that became politically incorrect. Saying that an e collar is a game changer becomes obvious when one realizes that it’s used as an aversive training tool. Aversive training means unpleasant stimuli is used to attempt to cause changes in behavior through punishment, immediately following an unwanted behavior from your dog. The likelihood of the behavior occurring in the future is then supposedly reduced. According to Fairhorsemanship, “shock collars are designed to provide aversive stimulus which is painful to a dog, as punishment or “correction” from its trainer or owner. Now, in all fairness, shock collars now come with a variety of more gentle sounding bells and whistles. There’s sound or “vibration” settings. Someone I know decided to try and stop her dog barking by using the sound setting. The dog started barking, she pushed the button and the dog freaked out and ran into the closet… and didn’t come out. She tried it again outside and the dog ran and hid behind a shed. So, the definition of pain, whether auditory or physical, becomes really subjective here. Sometimes trainers get people to put the e collar on themselves, so they can feel the “vibration”. It’s not exactly pleasant and, depending on the tolerance of the individual dog, it may need to go full force.
I’m a trainer that believes in, and uses, only positive reinforcement conditioning when working with dogs. If there’s an issue of inappropriate or “bad” behavior that needs to be addressed, I believe there are ways to change it without using pain or force; but that’s just me, and there are a plethora of positive tool alternatives to food if a dog is not motivated by that. The conditioning might just take a bit more time and patience and repetitions on the part of the owner .I’m often asked what I think about shock collars, and my response is, “When all other options have been exhausted, then give it a try with an experienced trainer.” According to an article from the San Francisco Standard, titled, “Wokeness Has Infected Dog Training…”, there is a huge divide among trainers in that city, a city that has more dogs than children, and aversive training techniques have come under fire. Of course, there are many situations that require corrections. The biggest problem, that I see, is that almost everyone that administers aversive/painful corrections, have absolutely no idea how to use those tools. It’s what I’ve seen, over many years, with owners that use pinch, or prong, collars on their dogs. They are almost ALWAYS ill fitting, and the person is applying continuous pressure when the dog pulls. Utterly and completely incorrect. These collars are actually illegal in some countries, as are shock (e) collars. Now, I don’t get involved in arguments or disputes with people that choose to send their dog away to board and trains, or trainers that employ aversive training…although sometimes the owners are actually unaware that this technique is employed, but I do try and educate them on the possible psychological and physical damage that can happen to dogs when this technique is used.
Just as with children, every dog has their own pain threshold, fears and motivating factors. If one uses more fear to change the behavior of an already fearful child, the trauma may last a lifetime. Something to think about when deciding how to train your dog.