The "Good Boy" syndrome

    
    In my opinion we as humans are not very good at rewarding the good and ignoring or correcting the bad behaviours. I do not know when we started going off track sort of speak, but I know we have lots to learn from animals in this respect. Many social problems would not exist if we learned to be black and white as animals are in their interactions. Same applies to humans vs dogs, humans vs horses and in our case humans vs parrots for example. As a matter of fact in my opinion it's  becoming quite common with parents vs children as well. 

    We simply reward the wrong things. Often times unintentionally to be honest. See I am writing this article as horse related, but it applies to dog training just as much. 

To explain more in detail what I mean, I will use examples. 

    I go to trim a horse that will let me pick up his foot, as I start working he will start taking the foot from me and starting to try to kick slightly. What would YOU do? I would apply some level of correction. Usually verbally at this time. I often or always talk to horses in neutral voice and in this point I would change the intonation of my voice and perhaps raise my voice a bit and sound firmer. Perhaps something like "knock it off buddy!"  Now correction should always be just as strong as it needs to be and no stronger, but thats a separate subject. Point is that many many many people will at this point come towards the horse, pet him and say in a calm soothing voice "it's OK buddy" or "good boy, relax". Stop and think about what just happened pls. This person very clearly rewarded the horse for doing the wrong thing. The horse isn't being bad, he was in my opinion very nicely and clearly asking "can I take my foot away or do I have to leave it on the stand while you are working"? And the owner told him "its OK if you take it away and try to kick this man.  Straight up, black and white in my opinion, there is no grey zone. The person would be much better off ignoring the horse rather then rewarding him or giving him attention for bad behaviour. Just like the pawing horse, if you keep telling him "stop that", he will never stop because even negative attention is an attention and that's what he wants.  
    Animals don't live in grey, its just black and white, thats why they are happy and relaxed until they have to deal with many humans. Simply because they do not understand what we want and why we are mad at them one day when they kick us, if thats what we were rewarding them for step by step all along till then. Of course this applies to every interaction, including riding. Often the best horses are the most sensitive and smart and often their humans taught them all their bad habits along the way without even knowing it ;-)

J.K.