Methods of Control; Preventing Chasing Their Desires? Or Building Accurate Responses?

Why is the agility and larger dog training community still so attached to the concept of “impulse control”? I still am seeing this terminology used, quite often, and I am honestly surprised we haven't moved on.

If we start by asking “What IS impulse control in relation to dog training?” I am not sure we can get a crystal clear answer. I dug around online for far too long in search of a clear answer, and only came up with a bunch of cringe-worthy marketing slogans and training videos for a wide variety of training styles and programs, some of which would make your toes curl. 

When I asked Google AI, I got; Impulse control in dog training is teaching a dog to pause and think before acting, rather than immediately reacting to an instinct or desire. This self-control helps prevent unwanted behaviors like jumping, barking, or stealing and is crucial for safety and improving a dog's overall demeanor and responsiveness. 

“Demeanor” aside (insert eye roll here), let's assume this “self control” assessment CAN be observably trained (which I have doubts about, but for the sake of this argument, fine). Due to the frequency with which we see and hear this phrase floating around, it is clear that that there is an assumption that this "ability to stop reacting to impulses” will help our agility training. We want to define what the dog *doesn’t* do, which is nebulous at best.

My current takeaway is that “solid impulse control” is an *absence* of behavior.  I.e., “don’t do XYZ…” Don’t jump up/steal the toy/take that tunnel/break your startline/etc.

How can you operationalize an absence of behavior? I am not clear on exactly how you explain or accurately define something that doesn’t exist. 

What you CAN operationalize is stimulus control—i.e., under stimulus control, the cue occurs, and a predictable behavior is consistently performed as a response to what is cued. 

Is a dog NOT responding to a cue “correctly” really a matter of poor impulse control? 

Or, is it a function of their understanding of the cue given (not to mention the timing of the cue given, factors/influences of the environment itself, etc)?

In my experience, dogs that are well-trained in their agility behaviors *rarely* go off the rails and make “poor choices”. They do what they think we wanted, 99% of the time (or, possibly, they are responding to the greater environment or other stressors, and are offloading their emotions, but that is an entirely different post for another time). 

Is a very responsive and accurate dog a function of the trainer focusing on “impulse control”? Ie. “Don’t do *that thing,* or else”–aka I will withhold reinforcement/apply negative consequences/etc?”

Or, is the dog’s consistently correct behaviors a function of;

• Fluency (aka clear understanding) of a specific cue or sequence of cues given
• Appropriate and varied reinforcement history in relation to the complexity/difficulty of the task at hand 
• Accurate timing/cuing by the handler

If as Google AI claims when describing impulse control, we have taught the dog to “think before acting,” and then he acts in a way that we perceive as “wrong,” then it is ultimately easier to blame the dog for having “poor impulse control,” than to take responsibility for our own lack of training efficacy.

Instead, we should be focusing on the clarity of our training mechanics, which includes clear avenues to reinforcement, and work on getting our reinforcers under stimulus control. Then, as we begin to teach obstacles, we ensure that the dog has a broad understanding of what those behaviors look like, and we add the associated cues (physical and verbal). Again, the key here is working to get and keep those cues under stimulus control.

If I say “tunnel” when I actually mean “teeter”, and the dog rockets across the ring into a tunnel instead of taking the teeter, that response is to be celebrated, not attributed to some sort of moral failure on the dog’s part. 

Even if I did say “teeter” and I got a different response, is that because the dog “isn’t thinking before he is acting”? It's certainly possible, but I highly doubt it. There is a lack of understanding there, a glitch in the comprehension, somewhere.

Stimulus control simply means; “do it when I cue it, don’t do it if I don’t cue it.”

A dog following cues correctly (or to the best of their ability), is a dog that is engaged, listening to the handler, and has a strong understanding of what those cues mean. That has nothing to do with “thinking before acting,” and everything to do with seeking predictable reinforcement antecedents (cues) and outcomes.

Its on us, the human half, to set the dog up to be correct, not be beholden to outcomes that are due to some intrinsic failing on the dog’s part. Let’s dump the “impulse control” obsession and focus on being better trainers instead.
~ Liz