You’ve seen this at a trial. I’ve done it myself, plenty of times.
A dog comes out of the ring either wired up or a little flat, and the handler crouches down and starts petting them. Big reassuring strokes down the side of the neck. And the dog leans away. Turns their head. Takes a step out of it. Maybe tolerates it for a second and then they’re gone.
We usually read that as the dog being over threshold, or “not connecting.” But watch it again, because the dog is telling you something pretty specific.
In THAT moment, in THAT context, being petted isn’t a reward. It’s something your dog is actively working to get away from.
Which means, technically, it’s an aversive.
I want to sit on that one for a second, because I don’t think it’s a small thing.
An aversive isn’t a category of equipment. It’s a category of EXPERIENCE. And your dog is the one who decides what goes in that category. Not you, not me, not a label on a box.
Now take the exact same dog and the exact same hand, that night on the couch. They lean in. They shove their head under your palm. You stop and they nudge you to keep going. Same petting. Completely different meaning. And if you deliberately stopped petting them right there to get some behavior out of them, that would be a punishment. A gentle one, sure. But that’s what it is.
Same hand, same dog. A reward in one context, an aversive in another, and a punishment when you take it away in a third.
Here’s the part that actually changes what you do at a trial:
Stop petting the dog who’s ducking. You think you’re lowering the pressure. From where your dog is standing, you’re adding to it, at the exact moment you were trying to help.
Go find out what your dog actually wants in THAT environment. It won’t be the same as what they want at home, and it might not be the same as what they wanted at the last trial.
And don’t assume anything is universally anything. I have one dog who thinks a finger tickling her nose is the best game going. I’ve known dogs who’d leave the room over it.
This is also why I’ve gotten a lot quieter about the phrase “I never use anything aversive with my dog.”
Not because I think anybody saying it is lying. I don’t. But once you really look at it from the dog’s side of things, you start to notice you might be using one RIGHT NOW, with your bare hand, with the kindest intentions in the world.
You can’t really opt out of aversives. You can only opt out of noticing them.
And noticing is the whole skill. A dog who gets listened to, in context, in the moment, is a dog who’s being trained by somebody who’s actually paying attention, which is worth more than any label we could stick on our training 🙂
Tell me in the comments what your dog does after a run. I’d love to know what you see once you start watching for it.
The whole system lives inside The Agility Challenge. If you want the training that goes with this, the door is here.