Trampled Paths: How Dogs and Humans Learn

Can dogs navigate by means other than their nose? How does learning and improving skills work, in humans too? It will be simple and, I hope, effective.

Come along 😊

Dogs navigate in several ways, and some of them work just like ours.

It all started when I didn't believe a specialist. Mrok was about a year old when he ran into an electric fence in the park. A few months later, in the same park, he gave that spot a wide berth on his own. The behaviourist we were working with concluded that young Mrok would soon forget it. A year later Mrok still recognised the place and was calmer than before, but he still consistently avoided it. I asked trainers in Australia; they saw it differently: working ACDs navigate by landmarks they have sometimes seen only once. These are practitioners' observations, not research results, but they were enough to get me searching.

Very young mammals quickly forget unpleasant experiences. It’s worth taking care not to push a dog into fear reactions, because it may turn out to be too late for him to forget them (as it was with Mrok and the electric fence).

The research did not side with the behaviourist. Rapid forgetting in young animals does exist, but it applies to infancy: rats trained on day 18 of life forgot their fear after a week, while adults still remembered it after 42 days (Callaghan and Richardson 2013). Fear can be stored after a single event, through rapid strengthening of the connections between neurons (Rogan et al. 1997). Myelin reinforcement comes later and helps maintain such a trace for weeks (Pan et al. 2020). In my view, what Mrok developed was fear-based "navigation".

https://video.wixstatic.com/video/25bef7_bc6257bc3d594aa98ba3128ce945afad/1080p/mp4/file.mp4

Canine navigation can happen over a small area or a very large one. We can see how a dog behaves in familiar or unfamiliar places by following his route on a dog tracking device.

Fear builds a fast track to memory. A very large reward works in a similar way: strong emotions, pleasant or unpleasant, strengthen the consolidation of memories (McGaugh 2004). The difference lies in what the dog is left with. That is why I am firmly opposed to aversive techniques. Frightening a dog is a shortcut that isn't even shorter: compared with training using an electric collar, reward-based training gave better results, and the collar was no more effective than training without it (China et al. 2020). Fortunately, most dog owners I know choose a life with a contented dog rather than one that is frightened all the time.

Different breeds can be predisposed to certain behaviours. Dogs from breeds developed to work with people, including herding breeds, learn noticeably better when a person shows them the solution.

A dog is a dog.

…but breed can matter

The learning mechanism is the same in all dogs. In a study of more than 18,000 dogs, breed explained only 9% of the differences in behaviour between individuals. At the same time, most behavioural traits are heritable. The authors explain it this way: behaviour is a legacy of thousands of years of selecting dogs for work, older than modern breeds, which differ mainly in appearance (Morrill et al. 2022). For me, breed is exactly that heritage of ancestral work, not the length of the tail or how high the ears are set 😊.

And this is where the differences do show, as you'll see below with the V-shaped fence.

Modern training means using many tools; whether it’s shaping, training in stages or deliberate use of Skinner’s quadrants matters less to us. What we pay particular attention to in our life with our animals is their welfare. That’s one of the reasons we use only reward-based methods.

How a dog learns to navigate

A dog does not navigate by nose alone. Researchers test this using simple obstacles and out in the field.

Here are a few examples of how dogs learn and how they make mistakes that are worth eliminating as quickly as possible.

•       A shortcut after one walk. German Shepherds were led once along two paths to two hidden bowls. Later the dogs took a shortcut between the bowls, a route they had never walked (Chapuis and Varlet 1987). Critics point out that recognising a familiar landmark from a different side would be enough here. For me it makes no difference: either way, the dog memorised the terrain after a single pass.

•       The V-shaped fence. A reward lies behind a transparent fence, and the dog has to go around it. Six attempts on their own were not enough for the dogs to improve clearly. When a person demonstrated the detour, the dogs improved within two or three attempts (Pongrácz et al. 2001). Dogs from breeds developed to work with people, such as herding dogs and retrievers, benefited from this kind of demonstration clearly more than dogs from breeds that work independently (Dobos and Pongrácz 2023).

•       The moved gap. Dogs went through a gap at one end of a barrier, then the gap was moved to the other end. After just two passes, 29 out of 30 dogs still headed for the old gap, even though they could see the new one (Osthaus et al. 2010).

Mrok is a travel dog; that’s what we call his main purpose: living with us, in our style. One of our greatest pleasures is discovering and watching how we learn each other, together.

•       Landmarks. Dogs learn where things are in relation to visible markers and to the overall picture of their surroundings (Milgram et al. 1999; Fiset 2007). This, only on a large scale, is exactly what the ACD trainers in Australia were telling me about.

•       The forest. 27 hunting dogs with GPS and cameras, more than 600 trials. When returning to their owner, the dogs either followed their own track or took a completely new route. The authors believe the dog has a map of the terrain in its head; the role of the magnetic field is their hypothesis (Benediktová et al. 2020).

•       Memory of events. Dogs reproduced a person's action that, by design, they were not meant to memorise; the person did it incidentally (Fugazza et al. 2016). Here we have an interesting combination: we simply do something, with no intention of showing the dog a solution, and the dog "accidentally" learns.

There are many ways to build a dog’s confidence. One of them is running the same training in different surroundings, starting with the one where the dog feels most confident. It’s important that the surroundings don’t “undo” the effects of the training. We always pay attention to the dog’s comfort.

To sum up.

Canine navigation also works without human "suggestion": the hunting dogs returned to their owner on their own, often by a new route. A person can, however, clearly speed it up by demonstrating the solution, at least in cooperative breeds. It gets even more interesting when dogs act entirely without human involvement. Wild dingoes hunt in a deliberate way and navigate effectively. That's a topic for another piece, but while you're here, it's worth looking at my article, where I explain why dogs sometimes roll and what that has to do with navigation.

However complex the learning process, each part the dog learns should be a challenge for him (it can’t be too easy) and should end in success.

What is learning?

…and what is forgetting

For over 30 years I taught several disciplines. Some of them required mastering complex skills, and students almost always achieved the best results when the skills were broken down into simpler elements, which they repeated many times and then combined into a whole. A particular catalyst for the best results was skilfully increasing the difficulty.

Teaching technical diving showed me how consistency in all of the above can build masters of the art. It gave me great satisfaction to watch my students achieve results far beyond my own skills.

I never expected to know how to train dogs, because I assumed it was something of a secret art.

Scrambling over boulders with a dog on a bungee lead is the result of combining several training elements. In the end, the person and the dog pay attention to each other, without getting ahead of or blocking one another.

So I was strongly and pleasantly surprised when, at a class with an excellent Czech specialist in animal training and behaviour, Jiří Ščučka, founder of Animal Training Academy (ATA), I heard him recommend Daniel Coyle's book The Talent Code to his students.

I had first read it almost 15 years earlier. People, dogs and cats learn in the same way. Or to put it differently: technically, we take in and consolidate new skills in the same way.

Neurons, synapses and myelin

(the same myelin sheath that divers learn about when studying the theory of narcosis)

In a moment I'll try to explain how it works.

Coyle reduces learning to myelin. It's a big simplification, though a justified one.

Neurons are nerve cells that form a network through which information travels. Axons are extensions of neurons that carry electrical impulses. Myelin forms insulating sheaths around axons. Between these sheaths are small gaps called nodes of Ranvier, where the electrical impulse is regenerated. This allows signals to travel quickly, as if jumping from one gap to the next. Synapses are points where information passes between neurons, usually through chemical substances called neurotransmitters.

Has anyone tried juggling?

Three balls, the first flies too high, the second lands on the floor, and after a few weeks… wow, you're juggling and talking 😊.

A team from Oxford taught 24 people to juggle for 6 weeks. Brain scans showed changes in white matter, where the myelin is, but also in grey matter, that is, the neuron cell bodies. One did not go hand in hand with the other, which suggests two separate processes (Scholz et al. 2009).

How can we understand memory pathways, these neurons, synapses and myelin?

Let's try with the help of… grass.

Imagine that a lawn is the place through which the information that lets us learn a new skill travels.

•       Neurons are spots on the lawn between which signals travel.

•       Synapses are the crossings between them. Each use tramples the grass between the neurons a little. A crossing used often becomes easier; an unused one grows over (hello? this is exactly where we start to forget!).

•       Myelin is asphalt laid where the traffic is regular. The signal then travels faster and more reliably.

People, cats and dogs learn in exactly the same way, but our “central processing units” often decide who can effectively self-correct and who needs a trainer.

Traffic tramples the path, the asphalt is laid as it happens and sets later. Mice that were blocked from forming new myelin did not master a new motor skill; to perform what they had learned earlier, new myelin was not needed (McKenzie et al. 2014). So, returning for a moment to Coyle's The Talent Code and slightly expanding on what his book focuses on: myelin is important, sometimes essential, but it is not the only way.

The moved gap from the earlier section on navigation is the same neural pathway. Two passes were enough to trample it, and the dog chose it despite a better way right next to it.

WARNING!

The brain consolidates every path, including the wrong one.

From a trick to kayak travel

At first I wanted the dog to learn everything at once. With simple tricks Mrok (ACD) is quick: in my experience two or three repetitions are enough. But moving around a kayak rocking on big waves is a complex skill.

We started learning to move around the kayak in big waves at home, with the kayak set up in the living room.

Goal: on command, Mrok is to move to the bow or the middle of the kayak along the right or the left side. He is to do this on a verbal command or a hand signal, and sometimes a combination of the two. While doing it, he should be able to stop. How important this is became clear when paddling on the Atlantic, where we managed 3 spectacular capsizes "judged" by naturists on a nearby beach 😉. That's why we went back to the details Mrok was trying to carry out.

We teach in stages:

kayak in the living room, kayak on calm water near the shore, a short paddle out, small waves, bigger waves. Each stage should be repeatable, but demand real effort from the dog and leave him satisfied at the end. Too easy: the dog gets bored. Too hard: the dog is unsure or afraid, and fear can be stored after a single time.

One of the stages of learning to kayak: Mrok moves from the bow to the middle of the kayak along the left side. Monika says “Do Wojtka, lewo” (“To Wojtek, left”) and lowers her left arm. In the photo, we’re practising in good conditions.

Does it work?

It works very well. We saw that during our last week of paddling on the Baltic in extremely varied conditions, and Mrok… had no idea how much reason he gave us for smiles and pride. Not a single capsize, perfect trim, carrying out commands as if he could see exactly that he had to beat the wave 😊.

In the final stage of learning to work together in the kayak, Mrok would lie low in the middle of the boat while we worked the paddles on a building swell.

What research says about the training itself:

1.      Shorter and less often can be better. Beagles trained once a week mastered the task in an average of 6.7 sessions, those trained 5 times a week in 9 (Meyer and Ladewig 2008).

2.      One session instead of three in a row. One session a day gave better results than three back to back, and after a 4-week break all the dogs remembered the task well (Demant et al. 2011). Both studies were on laboratory dogs.

3.      Place matters. New learning can be tied to the surroundings in which it happened, and extinguished fear returns most easily where it arose (Bouton 2004). That's why it's worth practising in different conditions.

The dog is sitting and... it’s really part of our training in walking together and crossing different terrain in full cooperation. Whether we add a lead or Mrok goes off-lead now depends mainly on the circumstances.

To sum up

Dogs and people learn in the same way: by rebuilding the network of neurons. A person can tell themselves what to improve. For a dog, training has to show it.

From our point of view, a good trainer is someone who knows how a dog learns, also "from the inside", and thanks to that achieves excellent results.

Have you ever taught a chicken?

No?

Me neither 😊.

…and they learn very quickly. ATA graduates and their trainer Jiří can tell you more about it.

Effective training teaches a dog more than specific skills; done well, it also builds his competence and confidence. In the photo, Mrok’s first encounter with a helicopter: we stood in a safe zone, and Mrok watched the machine land without fear.

Sources

If anyone fancies doing their own analysis, here are the materials I used.

Memory and fear

1.      Callaghan B.L., Richardson R. (2013). Early experiences and the development of emotional learning systems in rats. Biology of Mood & Anxiety Disorders 3: 8. doi:10.1186/2045-5380-3-8

2.      Rogan M.T., Stäubli U.V., LeDoux J.E. (1997). Fear conditioning induces associative long-term potentiation in the amygdala. Nature 390: 604–607. doi:10.1038/37601

3.      Pan S. et al. (2020). Preservation of a remote fear memory requires new myelin formation. Nature Neuroscience 23: 487–499. doi:10.1038/s41593-019-0582-1

4.      McGaugh J.L. (2004). The amygdala modulates the consolidation of memories of emotionally arousing experiences. Annual Review of Neuroscience 27: 1–28. doi:10.1146/annurev.neuro.27.070203.144157

5.      Bouton M.E. (2004). Context and behavioral processes in extinction. Learning & Memory 11: 485–494. doi:10.1101/lm.78804

Breed and the individual

6.      Morrill K. et al. (2022). Ancestry-inclusive dog genomics challenges popular breed stereotypes. Science 376: eabk0639. doi:10.1126/science.abk0639

7.      Dobos P., Pongrácz P. (2023). Would you detour with me? Association between functional breed selection and social learning in dogs. Animals 13: 2001. doi:10.3390/ani13122001

Navigation and memory in dogs

8.      Chapuis N., Varlet C. (1987). Shortcuts by dogs in natural surroundings. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology 39B: 49–64.

9.      Pongrácz P. et al. (2001). Social learning in dogs: the effect of a human demonstrator on the performance of dogs in a detour task. Animal Behaviour 62: 1109–1117. doi:10.1006/anbe.2001.1866

10.   Osthaus B., Marlow D., Ducat P. (2010). Minding the gap: spatial perseveration error in dogs. Animal Cognition 13: 881–885. doi:10.1007/s10071-010-0331-z

11.   Milgram N.W. et al. (1999). Landmark discrimination learning in the dog. Learning & Memory 6: 54–61. PMC311280

12.   Fiset S. (2007). Landmark-based search memory in the domestic dog (Canis familiaris). Journal of Comparative Psychology.

13.   Benediktová K. et al. (2020). Magnetic alignment enhances homing efficiency of hunting dogs. eLife 9: e55080. doi:10.7554/eLife.55080

14.   Fugazza C., Pogány Á., Miklósi Á. (2016). Recall of others' actions after incidental encoding reveals episodic-like memory in dogs. Current Biology. doi:10.1016/j.cub.2016.09.057

The brain and myelin

15.   Coyle D. (2011). Kod talentu. Jak zostać geniuszem. Wydawnictwo Szachowe Penelopa (Polish edition; original: The Talent Code, 2009).

16.   Scholz J., Klein M.C., Behrens T.E.J., Johansen-Berg H. (2009). Training induces changes in white-matter architecture. Nature Neuroscience 12: 1370–1371. doi:10.1038/nn.2412

17.   McKenzie I.A. et al. (2014). Motor skill learning requires active central myelination. Science 346: 318–322. doi:10.1126/science.1254960

Dog training

18.   Meyer I., Ladewig J. (2008). The relationship between number of training sessions per week and learning in dogs. Applied Animal Behaviour Science 111: 311–320.

19.   Demant H., Ladewig J., Balsby T.J.S., Dabelsteen T. (2011). The effect of frequency and duration of training sessions on acquisition and long-term memory in dogs. Applied Animal Behaviour Science 133: 228–234.

20.   China L., Mills D.S., Cooper J.J. (2020). Efficacy of dog training with and without remote electronic collars vs. a focus on positive reinforcement. Frontiers in Veterinary Science 7: 508. doi:10.3389/fvets.2020.00508

21.   Jiří Ščučka, Animal Training Academy. scucka.com

Go there, which is everywhere. Stop here, which is nowhere in particular. Live life to the full, and find joy in the happiness of others. www.Paws-To-Peaks.com