by caf. » Tue Jul 04, 2017 7:00 am
sorry for being unable to check on this topic, i was at a horse show. both accepted and will be added to the list shortly!
excellent discussion on this topic, i love hearing different viewpoints from varying trainers.
i would agree that 'punishment' is often wrongly defined as being very harsh when often negative reinforcement tends to be harsher when the concept of escalating pressure is utilized. i do tend to utilize punishment (a sharp yell and maybe a poke in the side) with my horse when the behavior becomes dangerous to his health, mainly to establish a negative association with the behavior so that he's unlikely to perform it again. since dangerous behavior in equines is most commonly associated with fear, i heavily reward any calm or 'acceptable' behavior in addition to the punishment for the dangerous behavior so that a clear boundary is established for how he can express his fear to me. generally, he is allowed to pace around, throw his head, snort, small behaviors like that; i much prefer an animal that can express its feelings through slightly undesirable behavior so that i might address the issue at hand over a totally shut down animal that expresses none of its emotions whatsoever. it's just that things rapidly become unsafe when you have a half-ton animal literally running you over or attempting to escape a tie and potentially run into a freeway or cause a stampede, yes? even in these cases if there's any chance for me to redirect i often choose that over punishing just to prevent making the situation potentially worse.
i definitely agree that punishment often escalates fear in the case of a fearful animal and redirection often reduces this urge. in the case of my horse rearing, bucking, spooking, etc it ultimately depends on the situation; either i continue to work him past the scary situation until he settles and then praise him heavily, or i work away from the situation until he settles and call it a day if he doesn't seem ready to conquer that fear. i never want him to develop negative associations with riding or jumping. for example, if he's getting bad transitions from the trot to canter (throwing his head up over the bit, racing into the transition, picking up the wrong lead, etc), instead of yanking him back to the trot and preventing him from cantering during a bad transition (giving him a bad association with the transition), i let himcsnter a few strides and then draw him back and continue working it until he gets a good transition, then reward him heavily for the good one.
caf - they/them - bi
equestrian - vocalist - student
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