Many animal trainers, veterinarians and pet owners highlight the importance of controlling animals. Controlling them, as in restricting the animals’ movement, their choices and their opportunities to control their environment through their behavior. Sometimes you have to, for safety reasons. But often you don’t – and more often than you might think. Actually, the trend in modern animal training is to deliberately and strategically shift control from the handler to the animal, while still staying safe. Giving control to animals enables us to better understand their quirks and preferences, not to mention reducing fear and improving welfare. In this session, the presenter will walk through a formal training session and discuss all the possible ways of handing control to the animal during training. For instance: Does the animal have control when, where and with whom a training session starts? When ending it? When individual trials within a session start (so-called start buttons). Which behavior to work on? Can he say, “No, actually, I changed my mind?” Can he choose his reinforcer? These questions and more will be discussed. Some might say it’s preposterous to allow the animal to dictate the training session. But that’s not what the presenter is saying you should do. After all, you have options, too, and one of them is to choose when to hand over control to the animal – and when not to.

Sponsor:Pet Professional Guild
Speaker(s):Dr. Karolina Westlund

Contact: Sharon Nettles
 Email: membershipcoordinator@petprofessionalguild.com
 Phone: 731-300-6520
 Web: https://petprofessionalguild.com/event-4300600