Constructional Approach to Animal Welfare and Training

How can we teach our dogs to have mutually enjoyable leisure walks? How can we apply Constructional Approach to achieve our goals on a walk? These are big questions we have been asking ourselves since 2020. In this episode, we will update you on the leash-walking procedure that has been successful with our dog, Chuu, and the dogs of the CAAWT Members. We will walk you through the procedure while navigating five critical features of the Constructional Approach and our journey of refining and applying the procedure. The Constructional Leash Walking procedure is intended to give the dogs what they are after, minimize contact with extinction, and be an easy procedure to apply during the walk. We also discuss the importance of assessment to determine if this is the right procedure. We hope you enjoy it!

Below is the link we mentioned during the episode:

⭐️Join CAAWT Membership and Attend FREE Membership Conference!
Hang out and geek out on the Constructional Approach and its applications and implications of working with animals and humans with amazing speakers.
Learn more and register: https://www.caawt.com/caawt-membership

💡Come and learn the science of behavior in the group class series:
https://www.caawt.com/online-group-class

We are back to podcasting!! In this episode, we share our recent work with one of the shelter dogs - Barry!

Barry, a 9-month-old, 100-pound puppy, was jumping and mouthing all over us to an extreme level. And he needed help to learn how to interact with people to obtain what he wanted, which was attention and interaction from people. You will hear how we applied Interaction Guidelines to effectively teach him how to ask for and receive affection from us. We hope you enjoy listening to Barry's shelter story as much as we enjoyed talking about it💕

Below is the link we mentioned during the episode:

🌼 Registration for video-on-demand of the CAAWT conference 2022! 

*The special discount applies to anyone who works or volunteers at an animal shelter, a veterinary clinic, zoo, or aquarium or is currently a university student or CAAWT Premium member. 

Register now: https://www.caawt.com/2022-conference

🌼The upcoming series of group classes will be announced on our website: https://www.caawt.com

🌼Join the CAAWT Membership: https://www.caawt.com/caawt-membership

🌼 Bailey Interview: https://www.caawt.com/the-bailey-interviews

In this episode, we share Sammy's journey of finding his forever home. Sammy was a dog that loved people. However, he was engaging in behaviors that prevented him from getting adopted. He would excessively jump inside his enclosure and when interacting with people. But all he wanted was affection from people. So, we used Constructional Affection to teach him how to ask for and receive affection from people and engage in desirable behaviors when greeting new people! On 5/22, a sweet family welcomed him to their family. We hope you enjoy this episode!

Below is the link we mentioned during the episode:

🌼 CAAWT conference 2022! Register for an Early-Bird ($150) or a special discount (ONLY $90!!) for the entire 6-days live conference! The special discount is available for anyone who works or volunteers at an animal shelter, a veterinary clinic, zoo, aquarium, or is currently a university student or CAAWT Premium member. 

Get it now and register at: https://www.caawt.com/2022-conference

In this episode, we explore the application of Constructional Affection to other species, such as equines, tortoises, birds, etc! To get us started, Sean and Maasa are discussing the conjugate reinforcement schedule and several questions to consider: When is it ideal to use Constructional Affection? How can we program our affection as a reinforcer? How can we set up the environment to ask the animal whether affection is working as a reinforcer? What are the desirable behaviors we want to shape through affection with equines that leads to mutually enjoyable relationships? We also share Interaction Guidelines with equines and safety protocols! We hope this episode can bring some conversation as to the development and application of Constructional Affection with other species.

Below are the links we mentioned during the episode:

🌼 CAAWT conference 2022! Get the Early-Bird registration or 50% off (ONLY 90.00!!) for the entire 6-days online conference at: https://www.caawt.com/2022-conference
*Early-Bird registration is available until 5/31/22!

🐶 Join us at the CAAWT Membership! https://www.caawt.com/caawt-membership
*You can do a trial of the CAAWT Membership for 14 days for only $1!

We have been going to our local animal shelter and working with their dogs for a while now! So, we wanted to share stories of three dogs that we got to work with: Ryder, Carmel, and Shelby. You will hear how the Constructional Approach helped them learn desirable behaviors to ask for and receive our interaction and affection, which is critical for finding their forever homes!

Watch the first session with Carmel

*We will soon be publishing Carmal's follow-up video and Ryder's video on CAAWT YouTube Channel!

Below are the links we mentioned during the episode:

❤️Constructional Affection group class. A 4-week group class starting on 4/16! Learn more and register:

https://www.caawt.com/constructional-affection

🌼 CAAWT conference 2022! Learn more and register! https://www.caawt.com/2022-conference

🐶 Join us at the CAAWT Membership!

https://www.caawt.com/caawt-membership

*You can do a trial of the CAAWT Membership for 14 days for only $1!

In part 2 of our interview with Dr. Susan Friedman, we have a thought-provoking discussion about the contributions, similarities, and differences the Constructional Approach has with other approaches to training and other behavior analytic approaches. Please enjoy as we explore this approach from its philosophic implication to its influence on real-world procedures!

Below are the links we mentioned during the episode:

🌼 CAAWT conference 2022! Save the date on July 25th to 30th! https://www.caawt.com/2022-conference

🌱 Enhancing Efficiency - Measurement, Data Collection, and Beyond!

https://www.caawt.com/measurement-data-collection-and-beyond 

*When we open the registration for the Constructional Affection group class, we will put the link below! CAAWT Member premium will get 50% discount on the group class fee! 

🐶 Join us at the CAAWT Membership!

https://www.caawt.com/caawt-membership

*You can do a trial of the CAAWT Membership for 14 days for only $1!

🌟 ABAI Conference in Boston in May, 2022!

https://www.abainternational.org/events/annual-2022.aspx

Happy New Year, everyone! We are kicking off our first episode of 2022 with an interview with Dr. Susan Friedman! In this first part of two episodes, Dr. Friedman describes her passion for behavior analysis, the contingencies that motivate people to continue learning and growing in this field, and the importance of adopting this animal training philosophy. Please enjoy this amazing interview with one of the pioneers of applications of Applied Behavior Analysis! 


Below are the links we mentioned during the episode:

📚 CAAWT Book Club - We will be reading the book, Nonlinear Contingency Analysis: Going Beyond Cognition and Behavior in Clinical Practice, by Dr. T.V. Joe Layng, Dr. Paul Thomas Andronis, R Trent Codd III, Awab Abdel-Jalil! We hope to see you there!

https://www.caawt.com/caawt-book-club 

🌼 CAAWT conference 2022! Save the date on July 25th to 30th! https://www.caawt.com/2022-conference

🐶 Join us at the CAAWT Membership!

https://www.caawt.com/caawt-membership

*You can do a trial of the CAAWT Membership for 14 days for only $1!

🌟 ABAI Conference in Boston in May 2022!

https://www.abainternational.org/events/annual-2022.aspx 

2021 is almost ending, and 2022 is at the corner! We are sure that you are starting to set goals and things you want to do in 2022! In this episode, we reflected on the goals we set for 2021, what we did to achieve our goals, and we also talked about our goals for 2022! We are looking forward to continuing learning and exploring the Constructional Approach and meeting our goals together in 2022! 

Thank you for listening to the CAAWT podcast for two years!  We wish you happy holidays and hope you all have an amazing new year with your lovely animal companions!

Below are the links we mentioned during the episode:

🌼 CAAWT conference 2022! Save the date from July 25th to 30th!:

https://www.caawt.com/2022-conference

🐶 Register and learn more about the CAAWT Membership: https://www.caawt.com/caawt-membership

*You can do a trial of the CAAWT Membership for 14 days for only $1!

🌱 Lili Chin's beautiful notes and illustration on what she learned in our Introduction to the Science of Behavior (Part 1) group class:

https://www.doggiedrawings.net/post/b-f-x-under-c

The Constructional Questionnaire (Goldiamond, 1974) is a powerful tool that can help guide our consulting and help achieve our client's meaningful goals that will sustain themselves easily in our absence. In this episode, Stuart Hoffman shares his learning journey of understanding the Constructional Approach, his first experience using the questionnaire, and its impact on the dog and their family. We hope you enjoy this wonderful interview!

Below are the links we mentioned during the episode:

🐶 Register and learn more about the CAAWT Membership: https://www.caawt.com/caawt-membership

*You can do a trial of the CAAWT Membership for 14 days for only $1!

🌱 Israel Goldiamond's 1974 Constructional Paper - "Toward a Constructional Approach to Social Problems: Ethical and Constitutional issues Raised by Applied Behavior Analysis"

The section that we specifically mentioned during the podcast is from pages 121 to 122, where Dr. Goldiamond compared Constructional and Pathological approaches.

You can download the paper from the link below: https://link.springer.com/article/10.5210/bsi.v11i2.92 


🌱The Degrees of Freedom paper - "Expanding the Behavior-Analytic Meanings of "Freedom": the Contributions of Israel Goldiamond" by Ramon Cardinali de Fernandes and Alexandre Dittrich

You can download the paper from the link below:
https://link.springer.com/article/10.5210/bsi.v27i0.8248?fbclid=IwAR1Ci5MF4SYVdyAcYLzie8kTDIFo4vU-VQnaj3xEt5fSCz2XUWxnlkayDeM

If you have any questions, please let us know😊

Join us for another fun and inspiring conversation with Chase Owens! Chase and Sean talked about how we can be constructional and practical for helping shelter dogs get adopted and stay adopted. Their conversation highlights the importance of how we choose a specific procedure and set our training goals. In the case of helping shelter dogs, the dogs need to learn desirable human-animal interactions that will help the dogs get adopted and stay adopted. Chase describes how Constructional Affection is an ideal procedure to help achieve this goal. Please enjoy!

Below are the links we mentioned during the episode:

🐶Register and learn more about the benefits of the CAAWT Membership:

https://www.caawt.com/caawt-membership

*You can try the CAAWT Membership for 14 days for only &1!

👨🏼‍🏫 Register and learn more about the group class - Introduction to the Science of Behavior (Part 1) starting on November 16th: https://www.caawt.com/introduction-to-science-of-behavior-1

🌼 Follow us on Social Media to get updates on our future events:

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/CAAWT 

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/npo_caawt/