I think your sister's approach is similar to what I would do with a horse- the same pressure-and-release approach, but in this case the pressure is the thing they don't want being near them and the release is moving it away when the horse does what I'm asking for. The important thing is that the horse gets release by being still and calm. There is a two-way thing here- you don't want to push the horse beyond what they cope with but you may need to push them a little bit. If you push them too far then they will probably run away and learn the wrong thing ( running away gets them away from the problem ) whereas what you want to do is to move the hose towards them or to make contact with them but not to scare them so much they leave. They do need to be able to move their feet though, so you will want to do this work somewhere there is a bit of room.
Typically I would expect to put the hose near to them and then just to stick with them if they try to move off so that when they move themselves it doesn't solve the problem of the hose being near them. Then wait until they pause or offer some try of something other than running away and take the hose away at that moment. The timing is essential here because the horse will learn from what is happening when you release and what you need them to learn is that by not running away from the thing they find scary it will leave them alone. You'll also need to observe carefully the moments they start to get nervous and to work around those. As you continue working you should find that you extend their comfort zone somewhat and make them feel better about the thing that had been bothering them.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2009-07-28 02:02 pm (UTC)Typically I would expect to put the hose near to them and then just to stick with them if they try to move off so that when they move themselves it doesn't solve the problem of the hose being near them. Then wait until they pause or offer some try of something other than running away and take the hose away at that moment. The timing is essential here because the horse will learn from what is happening when you release and what you need them to learn is that by not running away from the thing they find scary it will leave them alone. You'll also need to observe carefully the moments they start to get nervous and to work around those. As you continue working you should find that you extend their comfort zone somewhat and make them feel better about the thing that had been bothering them.