Association for Behavior Analysis International

The training of police and military working dogs is rooted in 19th Century Europe. Dog breeds that originated as pastoral herding animals in the Old World, and in an old century, have become instruments of civil policing and military power in a global 21st Century community stitched together by satellites, airliners, and computers. The methods by which working dogs were trained 100 years ago reflected traditional coercive notions of education and behavioral management. It was taken as a given that a dog should be physically forced to perform, and that much of its performance could and should be motivated by discomfort- and stress-avoidance. In this form, working dog training developed for perhaps 75 years, influenced chiefly by European ethology, and relatively isolated from American psychology and behaviorism. In the late 20th Century, powerful methodologies founded in the obscure field of exotic animal training began to penetrate, first into dog obedience training and companion dog behavioral management, then into the methods used by participants in international working dog competitions such as IPO (International Prufungsordnung). However, until recently police and military working dog training has not reflected this influence. It is only in the past 15 years that "operant methodologies" have been integrated into the field, with consequences that are still unfolding today.

Those interested in learning about dog training for military working dogs and how this training has been impacted by broader changes taking place in applied animal behavior.