The threshold of pain is different from one person or any living being to another, some dont have a voice to express or object to whatever pain they're experiencing or for it to be understood?

I agree , I did a study of pain in humans whilst at Uni and the outcome was that some people scream in pain , others will do something to distract themselves from the pain and look like they are behaving normally , but bottom line is if someone says they have pain regardless of what they are doing you treat the pain , dogs cant do that , you have to do that for them and make some assumptions about what may hurt ot not. One of my dogs has a real high tolerance pain level , the other squeals at the least thing , which one has more pain ?

I think there is a certain amount of pain involved in all aspects of life, and in that situation the dog obviously isn't bothered enough by the discomfort to alter it's behaviour- unlike the e-collar. Saying that if I had a situation where the dog was causing itself pain I'd adjust my methods to suit- using a harness and training heelwork without the lead first, for example.

Why is why people do loose lead training, use harnesses, etc. - they're working to prevent pain, not using pain to train for something else.

good stuff ,all.....keep it comming...what would you say about ,all the dog who are getting buy with owners who really dont train,the dog just gets it ....i dont really have to train all that much, the dogs seem to fall in line...my pup now ,i dont seem to have to work as hard while there are other dog around ...never used a collar in traing a pup.although they do go for walks aften.and they dont mind them....and sometimes i dont get why some would drop there dog off at the trainers and leave the dog there ,while they left to come back later.....if you bring me your dog..you stay to....go get your rubber boots!!!

Looks very painful to me!

I really don't even know why this thread even comes up. Everyone has their different opinions. This is my opinion, and many of you will not like it. Its just my two cents worth, if you don't like it, give me a penny back and go on your way.

If the only way you can seem to train a dog is with an E collar, shock collar, stimulas collar, vibrating collar, whatever you want to call it, then you really need some useful hobby, because you sure don't need a dog..........

I'll try to answer scotty's question, which seems to be that he's against the use of pain in dog training & is happy to speak out about the cruelty & dangers of using ecollars, but would like to do so from a knowledgeable viewpoint. As far as I'm concerned that's a good thing to do & all credit to him for asking.

Firstly, as everyone has said, no-one can tell exactly how much pain each individual dog experiences at the different levels an ecollar can be set ~ same as for people. To some, a mild static shock is no more than a tingle, for others, it's extremely painful. Not only that but the level of pain that each dog/person experiences can vary from shock to shock, depending on the internal physiological state of the dog, to the context in which the shock is given, to the thickness of the coat, the weather conditions (humidity levels), where the collar is placed etc etc.

On top of that every persons experience of pain is different depending on the sensitivity of the neural pain pathways (this was the subject of a very enlightening Horizon programe a few weeks ago ~ "The Secret World of Pain"). So therefore it can depend on early life experiences of pain that may have caused super-sensitive pain pathways. Scientific research is starting to show that some premature babies that are subjected to painful procedures at this early age develop very senstive pain pathways & may be more likely to suffer ongoing chronic pain in later life. How many of us know the exact circumstances of our dogs' births & what they may have been subjected to at that young age!! A scary thought!

The only clues that we have as to the level of pain a dog feels when shocked by an ecollar, is to observe their behaviour. This is not an exact science, is very subjective for both the dog being shocked & the person trying to judge it. It also relies on the person administering the shock to be an extremely acute & knowlegeable observer of dog behaviour, to know the individual dog concerned very well & how it is likely to react in all different circumstances. I think even the most canny & experienced of dog trainers/behaviourists would struggle with that one! And then it can also vary each time the dog is shocked. Then some dogs start to react less to the shock & others start react more strongly each time the shock is administered, but this doesn't necessarily mean they feel more or less pain.

So in simple terms, we just don't know how much pain is caused to each dog each time it is shocked.

Then there is the whole moral & ethical issue of using pain to train. This has been well discussed in this thread & others many times. It is cruel, immoral & sadistic to use pain to train a dog. We wouldn't dream of using it to teach children, & anyway it's illegal, so why on earth would anyone possibly think that it's ok to use pain to train a dog?

Then there's the whole learning theory issue ~ even if we could judge the level of pain & administer just the right amount of pain, what would a dog learn from being shocked? Many times the dog would learn absolutely nothing because the startle factor & the scare of receiving a shock would immediately fill up all of the short term memory slots leaving no room for any proper learning to take place. Then, if the dog is capable of learning anything in this state, there's the issue of what associations the dog may make between receiving the shock & whatever else was going on at the time, the location & the context of the shock. What if another dog walked past just as the dog was shocked? Would the dog associate the sight or presence of another dog with the shock?

There are other reasons for not using pain to train dogs ~ the whole issue of creating stress, for instance. But if you want to be able to explain to people why ecollars are cruel & not a good way to train dogs, I've given plenty of reasons & if you read through some of the other threads on ecollars, you'll find plenty of others.

True

This bit is actually extremely important. A dog who experiences pain from a shock collar may realise that yelping, bolting, giving appeasement etc does not "work". It does not stop the painful experience.

So what the dog DOES learn to do is to work out how to switch off that pain by doing some sort of "required" behaviour. It's escape/avoidance training.

So even when we see dogs with shock collars who do look fine, all they are doing is learning to escape/avoid by working out a behaviour or by already knowing what to do.

By that, I mean that some shock collar users use shock to make the dog go faster and more responsive, so the dog really does have to be quick off the mark to "beat the stim".
It's like a race to some

I've seen videos of dogs who are racing back on recall, yet who are punished by the stim AS THEY ARE RACING BACK. This is more advanced shock collar training (but it seems to me, the more advanced it gets, the worse it gets ). The dog simply believes it was not quick enough to avoid punishment and yes, pain.

So to reiterate, I agree with Wilbar - you cannot know what a dog is suffering when wearing a shock collar, because the dog's learning experience might be that normal expressions of pain and appeasement do not work ,the only thing to do quickly as possible is to try to work out how to escape/avoid the punishment.


Nice way to train, eh?

Wys
x

I believe that people use shock collars because if they simply hit their dogs with sticks to cause the pain, or kicked them when they didn`t come back, a public spirited citizen would intervene. Clandestine sadism. JMO.