#103 - Adaptations for [Human] Accessibility

Every human experiences and operates in the world in a unique way. That means that the way each person cares for their pet will be unique, too! So, how do we make adaptations for humans to successfully work with and enrich their pets? Tune in to this episode to find out!

You can find the full episode show notes here.

Transcript

[00:00:00] Allie: So, okay, the first thing that I am looking at when I am looking at how to adapt. Something for someone. That was vague, but on purpose. We'll, we'll get there in a second. Is, is the thing that I'm asking for necessary? And y'all might hear some parallels between what we talk about with enrichment for animals and the way that we make adaptations for our human learners because it's, it's, it's the same process, honestly.

Learners are learners regardless of species and so we're going to have kind of the same overarching framework that, that we use. So the first thing is, is it necessary? Do, does this person or animal have to actually do the thing that we are asking them to do?

Welcome to Enrichment for the Real World, the podcast devoted to improving the quality of life of pets and their people through enrichment. We are your hosts, Allie Bender...

[00:01:11] Emily: ...and I'm Emily Strong...

[00:01:12] Allie: ...and we are here to challenge and expand your view of what enrichment is, what enrichment can be and what enrichment can do for you and the animals in your lives. Let's get started.

Thank you for joining us for today's episode of Enrichment for the Real World, and I want to thank you for rating, reviewing, and subscribing wherever you listen to podcasts.

Last week, we heard from Gabrielle Johnson and one of the topics we discussed was disability justice in animal welfare. This week, we're going to dive further into adaptations for human accessibility and talk about implementation with the animals, and humans, in your life.

In this implementation episode, Emily and I talk about Why am I? Do you really need a marker? How easier isn't necessarily necessary. Choreography for harnessing. And collaboration is key. There is a content warning for this week. There is a mention of a coercive ABA technique. 

So, I'm really excited about this topic because every single person experiences and operates in this world differently than another person. We're all just beautiful little snowflakes of individuality. And so, I'm so sorry that I said that, and Ellen's 100 percent gonna keep that in there. 

[00:02:27] Emily: It was unnecessarily creepy, but, but I'll give you a pass. It's fine. I feel like I need to say it in a not creepy way though, just to sort of like balance it out. So, I'm just going to say we are all individual snowflakes. That's true. But without the creepy voice, it sounds reasonable. So, all right. 

[00:02:45] Allie: Thank you. I don't know why I am right now. But it's fine. So, because every person is an individual, we, we learn these ways to train, or we learn these protocols, or these exercises, or whatever it is, and it doesn't work for everybody. And I would say that it doesn't work for the majority of people if you're, if you're focusing on just one very specific way to teach or do something. And so I think that as a whole, We need to be looking at adaptations for accessibility a lot more than we already are, and then we have that additional layer that Gabrielle talked about last week when we're working with differently abled people.

[00:03:26] Emily: Yeah, I feel like I had a missed opportunity to talk with Gabrielle about the nuts and bolts of how they adjust to the needs of their learners. But, we can use this implementation episode for that because we have a long and storied history of adjusting to meet the needs of our learners. So, let's just do that now.

[00:03:45] Allie: Absolutely. So, okay, the first thing that I am looking at when I am looking at how to adapt. Something for someone. That was vague, but on purpose. We'll, we'll get there in a second. Is, is the thing that I'm asking for necessary? And y'all might hear some parallels between what we talk about with enrichment for animals and the way that we make adaptations for our human learners because it's, it's, it's the same process, honestly.

Learners are learners regardless of species and so we're going to have kind of the same overarching framework that, that we use. So the first thing is, is it necessary? Do, does this person or animal have to actually do the thing that we are asking them to do?

[00:04:40] Emily: Okay. So my, my favorite that I use the most often is getting rid of the marker. Because I know people had big feelings about Rachel Gilchrist's paper about clickers and, and markers in general. People had big feelings one way or the other, but I read that paper and I was like, yeah, like it just, it, it did not, it did not seem to me that it needed to be as controversial as it was because in my experience um, markers, whether we're talking about clickers or verbal markers or whatever, really only make a difference in training when we're doing long distance, and we need to mark something that an animal did far away from us. So there's going to be a gap in time between the thing that they did and our ability to deliver consequence. 

Or when it's really, really nuanced behavior, like, shifting where your eyes are looking that kind of thing, the, the, the nuanced behaviors where it's tiny adjustments in behavior is another place where I find markers to be actually helpful. 

And sidebar, I know that technically we all have secondary reinforcers that happen when we reach into our bait bag or whatever, but I'm talking about the intentional markers that we manufacture, like a clicker, or a verbal marker, or something, right? So like, honestly, markers are usually the first thing to go for me, because if people are struggling with the mechanics of clicking the clicker, or if they're struggling with the sequencing of saying a verbal marker before they do the thing It's almost never necessary for the animal to understand what you're asking them to do. 

And I care a lot more about clear, successful communication with the learner than following all of the rules that our profession have created. So, most of the time, if my learner is struggling with a marker, I'm going to throw it out because unless we're doing something long distance or we're doing something really nuanced, I don't actually need the marker to be there. So that's one example of like, is it necessary? 

The other example of, is it necessary is like, are the skills that we've all been told that animals need to learn actually necessary for us to address the struggles that the animal is having? And the answer is usually no.

And the reason that I know that is because I spent years working with non dog species. And and so many times training wasn't actually involved. We will talk about this in Ayoka's implementation episode, like what even is training anyway and what do we mean by that? So, stay tuned for that in a couple of weeks, but for now when I say training, I mean these like, Discrete trial training sessions where we have our bait bag, and we're practicing on something, and we're doing several trials of it, and, we are shaping a behavior or whatever. In this context, that's what I mean by training. 

But a lot of times the, the non dog and non horse species that I worked with didn't actually need any kind of, capital T training session. They just needed. enrichment. They just needed their environment to be adjusted. They needed communication skills between them and the humans in their lives. And and then it occurred to me one day, like, why do we feel that dogs and horses need so much more capital T training than all the other species? Do they actually need it? Or is it just like, the cultural expectations that they need it. I am not anti training and I am not saying that animals don't need to learn skills. That is not the point of this. 

The point is a lot of times we have been culturally conditioned to believe that dogs and horses in particular, need skill building in situations where they just need environmental adjustments. They need more control over their life. They need more access to their own reinforcers that they can choose for themselves. They need better communication skills with the people in their lives so that they can be heard and people can understand what they're asking for. And so that is also true for dogs and horses, right? That's not, it's not, they're not the exception to the rule. It's just our cultural conditioning that makes us believe that. So a lot of times, if I go in to work with a client and they're struggling with something with one of their pets. They're struggling particularly specifically with training itself for whatever reason. Then my question to myself is, is the training the skill actually necessary? 

I'm not asking if it would be helpful because of course it would be helpful. Skill building is helpful in general. But is it necessary? And often the answer is no, we can get away with a combination of management, and giving the animal control over their ability to entertain themselves. And oftentimes that ends up being a good solution for people for whom training is difficult, either physically, or emotionally, or cognitively, or logistically, right? 

[00:09:36] Allie: And I, I just want to pull on a thread that, that I just heard of, not necessarily is it easier or anything like that. I remember a client who had a, a difficult history with food. And for her, using food and training was it's very emotionally difficult. And so, is it, do I think it's easier to train using food? Yes, I think it's easier. And it wasn't easier for this particular situation. And so she asked, can I train using something else? And I said, yeah, let's do toys. Your dog likes toys. Let's do it. So, we need to separate out necessary, would it work, would it not work, easier, and really just look at the necessary part of it instead of all of the other things that we typically have come along for the ride when we're asking about is it necessary.

So. Let's say that we've determined that something is necessary. We do actually have to do a particular thing. Have to do, or it's the best solution out of several, maybe less than perfect solutions. The next step is to figure out what is the problem. And this, for those of you who are professionals listening, this is where you are going to have to have a lot of dialogue with your clients, you're going to have a lot of questions, and really you have to get to know how does this person experience, and interact with, and operate within the world.

I actually love this part because at the end of the day, and I think I've mentioned this before, humans are animals, and human behavior is animal behavior, and I freaking love animal behavior. And human behavior is so fascinating to me. And so, for me, this is actually a really fun part of the job, is getting to learn how somebody else experiences the world and the way that they experience it, and that's differently than I do.

And so, one of my favorite examples of this, I had a client who, and now I was very lucky in this situation, in that she even put on her history questionnaire. She said, I am neurodivergent, here are the ways in which I am neurodivergent. And so, I was able to come into that first session already knowing some of the ways that I was going to have to adapt what I typically recommend for her. But that didn't mean I knew everything about how she experienced the world.

And so, she and I had a lot of conversations about the things that are hard for her, and the solutions that she has already found. She had been living with, with her brain and body for, 50 something years, she knew solutions already, and so I got to learn from her what worked and figure out how do I adapt that into the training with her dog.

And so for her, she had this cute little puppy. Oh, this puppy. And they were working on potty training. And typically the recommendation for potty training is you watch them and see when are they showing signs that they need to go potty, and then take them outside. Or you set a clock, a reminder every hour, every two hours, whatever it is.

And so we had gotten to the point where she was like, okay, the puppy is old enough that she can hold it, but I'm not able to see when she needs to go outside. She said, I have time blindness, I am not able to, like, remove myself from a task that I'm working on, and be able to see the environment around me.

And I said, okay, so, visual cues are not gonna be it for you, that is not a thing that is going to work. And so we taught her puppy, to do a little nose target to her leg so that the puppy could say, excuse me, I need something right now. And we didn't just do it for potty training. We just had that as the attention getting cue for this puppy, because the human needed the tactile cue instead of a visual cue. And that was one of my favorite cases that I've of, of getting to figure out what was going to work for both this cute puppy and her awesome human.

[00:14:01] Emily: I love that story, and I love that she already knew enough about herself and her own challenges that you could collaborate on a solution, and I think that is, that's behavior consulting at its peak, when instead of coming up with a solution for your client, you come up with a solution for with your client. And I think that's beautiful.

One of my favorite, examples of collaboration was working with a client who was really struggling with his hand movement. And, and the hand movement was getting in the way of him being able to successfully harness up his dog. Because the dog would get really flustered, and excited, and distracted by the hand movement, and would try to chase the hands instead of being still long enough for him to put the harness on. And so, the solution was not something I would have come up with on my own. It was a dialogue between the two of us about what would help. And it was, particularly important to have that collaborative conversation with him because he had come from a background of an ABA technician focusing on like quiet hands, which is a really coercive approach to keeping hands still instead of embracing people's individuality. And so it was, it was extra important for him that he be a participant in this process because I did not want to Kind of recall any of the struggles that he had, the experiences that he had as a child. 

So, what we, what we ended up finding out was the solution was coming up with things for his hands to do between each step that were constructive, so that he could still move his hands, but they minimize the distraction and I never would have come up on that on my own.

It was, it was all about that collaboration of help me help you by you tell me what the, what your problem is and then we can work together to come up with the solution for that. And so, I, we ended up writing it on his whiteboard, each step. And it was almost like every other step was about the harnessing and then the alternating steps were about what to do with each hand in the meantime. And it was almost like a choreograph. It was like a dance where it was like, put your hand here, put your, your, put your left hand here, put your right hand here, do this with your left hand, do that with your right hand. And we practiced that choreography. And it became really smooth and fluid, and the dog really responded to it.

And we were able to successfully get that dog harnessed in way less time than any previous attempts that he'd had with previous trainers, because we collaborated to identify the problem and the solution together. And, and that was just a very special moment for me.

[00:16:50] Allie: And I think that is a fantastic segue into the next step, which is what are the solutions? One of the big commonalities between the stories that we have is that the solution is collaborative with the person. Because again, remember, people have been living within their own bodies and brains for much longer than you have known them, probably.

And so, they already know a lot of what works for them. Like, I know I can't stand very long with my chronic illness, and so I have a myriad of solutions for that particular thing. So if somebody were to ask me to stand for a while, I would go through my solutions and figure out what works best for me.

So really we need to be collaborative when we're talking about solutions. And one of the ways that I think that works best in order to collaborate is to explain what my goal is in its essence, so that the other person knows what I'm trying to achieve by doing this, and they can figure out what's going to work for them.

So for example, I had a client who was in a wheelchair, she was paralyzed from the waist down, and we were working on muzzle training with her dog. And now, one of the things that I do for muzzle training, there are a whole lot of different ways to do muzzle training, I will say that, but when you get to the step where you need to start playing with the straps, and continue feeding through the muzzle and you need like three or four hands but you, I only have two hands and that's not enough hands for that step. What I do is I put the muzzle between my knees so that I have both hands available. That works really, really well for me, it works well for a lot of my clients, not all of them, we have to find other solutions for, for many people.

But that is typically how I start teaching it and then I adapt as I need to. That was not going to work for this client who would not be able to squeeze a muzzle between her knees and hold it there. So I told her, here's why I do it this way, I just need the muzzle to not move and I need to be able to access the front and all of that. So I told her all of the reasons why I did it the way that I did it. And

she said, oh, yeah, I can find something to do for that. And so I didn't even have to give her the solution. I just had to say, here's the criteria that the solution needs to meet. And she said, Let me play around with it. I'll figure something out.

And sure enough, by our next session. she had figured it out. And I think what she ended up doing was because she would need to use her lap. She would, you know, a lot of times like people will do like a hook on a wall or something. She wouldn't have been able to do that from her chair. And so she was able to create like a dam out of towels so that that held the muzzle in the chair.

with her so that she could still be working on the muzzle training with her dog. It was a really cool solution and honestly one that I would probably not have been able to come up with because I don't have the same experiences that she does.

[00:20:03] Emily: That goes along with the collaborative part that we were talking about. And then also there are times where the client really can't figure out the solution for themselves. And so we can still have a collaborative process of identifying, is it necessary?

What's the actual problem? and the way to find out the solution, if your client doesn't have a solution for themselves is to do the reverse of what you just said, Ali, which is asking the client for their criteria of like, what, what are they struggling with? Right. And so I had, I worked with a client that was really struggling with sequencing.

That was the challenge for him. And we were. We were trying to get him to be able to walk his dog with minimal struggle with the dog staying engaged and checked in and not pulling reducing reactivity, all of those things, and it was necessary because they lived in an apartment. So the only way for the dog to get out and get exercise was.

Getting leashed up and going out of the house, whether they're driving to a sniff spot or to a park or just walking on the neighborhood leash walking was a necessary part of that process. So we couldn't get rid of the leash walking easily in a way that was sustainable. There were there were We found some ways that they could take breaks but doing that every day would not have been sustainable for them. So the leash walking was necessary. The problem was the sequencing and he could not figure out a solution for himself for that. So, what I, we worked on, I had him get one of those jogging leashes that went around his waist. Just in the meantime, so that he could walk the dog and if the dog was pulling the dog was pulling from his core instead of pulling from his shoulder and there was less, he would get less flustered if he didn't have to struggle with the dog in his hands. But in the meantime, what we worked on. In his house was just practicing the sequencing by himself without a dog, without a leash, just practicing the sequencing. And we use tag teach. So he had tag points and we just practiced that sequencing over and over until it became muscle memory.

And then we included the leash and we practiced the sequencing until he was comfortable having the leash in his hand. And then we added the treat pouch. And so then he practiced the sequence with the leash and the treat pouch. And then we added the dog. And by that time he was actually able to do it because the sequence he had practiced so much that he didn't have to think about it anymore. It just was. It just came naturally to him. So he had not come up with that solution, but he did give me the criteria, the things that were overwhelming to him, the things that were challenging to him.

And the reason that he was having a hard time with the sequencing was he was getting flustered with the leash, and the treats, and the dog pulling, and the dog barking, and all of that. And when he told me that criteria was that it was all of the like sensory overload that was disrupting his ability to do sequencing.

It was like, okay, well let's get all rid of all the sensory stuff and just practice the sequence. And then we'll add in the sensory stuff one at a time. And so that was how we were able to come up with that solution. Is he could give me his criteria and then I could find a workaround for that. So even when your client can't come up with their own solution, you can still work with them collaboratively to figure out the best approach for them. 

[00:23:18] Allie: And then, finally, the last step should come as no surprise to any listener of this podcast, and that is trial and eval. So we have what we think is going to be a solution, but we need to see, is it actually a solution?

[00:23:36] Emily: I have the perfect example for this because I had a client with MS And so she would have periods of being able to do more, and then other periods of time where she just had to do less. And she had a teenage airedale doodle mix. Which the dog was a delight. And also I would have struggled meeting this dog's needs. So she was a real trooper. And he was, he was just a wonderful dog, wonderful dog. So, some of the issues that she was having with him was if he didn't get dog playtime, he would get really amped up climbing the walls, couldn't focus, couldn't do the things. She was training him to be her service dog, and even though he was, a teenage Airedale poodle mix. So, a little bit extra, I actually saw a lot of potential for him because when he was working with her, he was very tuned into her. He was, he loved his job. He loved working with her. He was really pro social. He was a, he was the goodest boy and I knew that he had it in him to be a service dog. We just needed to get him through his teen years. And so, so she was working with him on service dog training, and it was necessary. We couldn't, we couldn't not do it. But she sometimes would have moments where she couldn't work on service dog training, much less actual, just like keeping a dog in her house. 

So, one of the things that she struggled with was her her backyard was lower than her, the main floor of her house. So in order to access the backyard, there were stairs. And eventually she was going to have to get some construction workers in there and build a ramp for her to get down there, but that wasn't her reality at that time. And there were some days where she could make it down the stairs and other days that she couldn't make it down the stairs. 

And so, one of the things that. I thought would work that I, that we, after talking with her and collaborating, I thought that we could do was have her stand on her balcony instead of going downstairs and doing scatter feeding so that he could go down, get some nose work in, get some exercise in, get out of her hair for 30 to 60 minutes and then come back. And so that seems like a solution for the days when she couldn't go down and play with him in the yard. And it seemed like it would meet everybody's needs, but lo and behold, he didn't want to do that in the yard by himself. 

It was very sad for him to have to do nose work in the yard without her accompanying him. And so it was not a successful strategy. So what we did in the meantime, what we had, I did have a plan for her to work on him being able to play independently because even though he's a service dog and he's going to be spending a lot of time with her, every dog should be able to be alone sometimes. And so that was important for both her and him that they were able to take a break from each other. So we did work on, we had a shaping plan for, for him being comfortable doing nose work in the yard when she couldn't go down the stairs with him. But in the meantime, what we did is we put an X pen in her front yard that wrapped around her front door so that she could open the front door and throw food out and let him do nose work and she could stay in her chair by the front door while he did nose work, she was able to monitor him, he was able to do the sniffy stuff and get some exercise and he didn't mind doing it. Because her being in her chair at the front door was close enough for him. It was enough for him. He felt accompanied enough. And so the X pen around the front door and, in part of the yard ended up being the temporary solution while we were able to do the longer term solution of scatter feeding out the back door. 

And that ended up being a successful strategy, but we had to trial and eval it because the first thing that seemed like the best solution ended up not being the solution we thought it was. We, we would not have known that if we hadn't tried it. So we had to adjust our strategy, but it ended up working beautifully.

And I think he, she only needed the X pen around the front door for like a month. And then by that time he was able to go out and do his, eat his, his meal out in the yard all by his lonesome. And, and that was, that was the solution that ended up working over the long term.

[00:28:07] Allie: Sometimes you just need a friend.

[00:28:08] Emily: Sometimes you just need to be witnessed eating your food out of the grass. Like somebody needs to see you foraging and tell you you're the boy at foraging.

[00:28:17] Allie: Facts. I would, I would agree if I were a dog. Yeah. Alright, so this week we talked about adaptations for human accessibility. And that includes asking, is it necessary? What's the problem? What are solutions for that problem? And then, of course, trial and eval to figure out if the solution is actually a solution.

Next week, we'll be talking with Ayoka Babar about dog sports as enrichment. 

If you're anything like me, you listened to a podcast episode, and the little gremlin toddler in your brain is like, the world needs to know this! So, if that's you right now, and while you were listening to this episode, you thought of someone who could benefit from it, go ahead and text them the link to this right now. I'm tasking you with being an enrichment ambassador so that together we can improve the quality of life for pets and their people.

Thank you for listening. You can find us at petharmonytraining.com and @petharmonytraining on Facebook and Instagram, and also @petharmonypro on Instagram for those of you who are behavioral professionals. As always links to everything we discussed in this episode are in the show notes and a reminder to please rate, review and subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts a special thank you to Ellen Yoakum for editing this episode, our intro music is from Penguin Music on Pixabay.

Thank you for listening and happy training.