#dogstuffs

[animalloversxo]

🐶🤍🤍🧸🤍🤍🐶

[miryalle]

Zzzzz

[elzythedonkey]

Titan ❤️

[bayoubluebirb]

not a bird but i HAD to share this hilarious moment 😭 meet Tito

[artemsolop]

qt

[always-someone-else]

It is too hot to be upright. Even for yogurt.

[authorelizabethhunter]

Mom. You’re the worst. The. Worst. (She’s fine, she just had a cyst rupture and she won’t leave it alone.) #dogstuff https://www.instagram.com/p/CnAdeERy2GL/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[miryalle]

Even thousands of years after the statue is built, people still pet the dog. As they should.

Via @korvys​ (Twitter)

[autumn-maple13]

Sometimes new adventures start from simple things

[animalloversxo]

♥️♥️♥️♥️

[miryalle]

My sweet Nina. Such a cute girl. Her big brother loves her, too! Her name is from an anime.

[elzythedonkey]

The last walk with my Titan… my grand pup ❤️ October 2013-October 2023

*don’t ever allow your partner to make a choice between your pet and them. This sweet boy lost

[always-someone-else]

Dogs, actually, don't need AAC. They need humans to make more of an effort to meet them halfway and pay attention to the huge amounts of communication they already do. 

Big big this. I always struggle finding the right words, but everyone lording on about “talking” with your dog through buttons rubbed me the wrong way and I couldn’t verbalise exactly why it felt wrong/unnecessary. This has hit the nail on the head though.

Because I want to be a committed hater, I am reading How Stella Learned to Talk by Christina Hunger. She opened with a prologue that outright stated her dog can talk. Sure.

I know that I am probably annoying at this point and it's hard to not be biased now that I've reached this hater position, but here are my thoughts so far from reading the first six chapters.

The first chapter was a story about how she did not work out what a child patient of hers was trying to communicate for six weeks until she came upon the object he was referring to by chance. She frames this as an amazing breakthrough and example of this child's ability, which it is, but it's also an example of her struggling for six weeks to understand something that, by the sounds of it, could have been worked out faster if she had enquired further than she did about the child's previous history in the therapy office. By putting this story in chapter 1, it's also telling us a lot about how she already views communication and her work. The framing of this narrative is to set up the idea that disabled children (and, later, dogs) are trying to talk to us if we just listen hard enough – and also ensure they are communicating specifically through an AAC device using words we accept and understand. Feels weird.

The second chapter was about two doodles she dogsat who used a bell to communicate, and how it seemed sad to her that she could not understand their vocalisations.

Ringing their bell was just supposed to mean they wanted to go outside, but I started noticing that Ozzie seemed to ring it for all his needs. I wondered if he used the bell for everything because that was his only option.

I found this passage frustrating. It seems to me that the dog is using the bell because any other communication is ignored. The dog is likely communicating different things in different ways, but the humans have been told to pay attention to the bell. So the dog adapted. This is an example of humans being poor listeners, not dogs being limited communicators.

Chapter 3 was a story about how she applied for a dog at a shelter, was denied, then immediately – as in, same day – bought a puppy from Craigslist. Only to find that night she had been approved at the shelter after all. To me, this did not read as an endearing story but an exasperating one.

In chapter 4 Hunger demonstrates that she was incredibly observant of Stella and her broad range of communication abilities. Hunger seems surprised that everything Stella did was surrounded by communication with humans. This is not some breakthrough, but I can appreciate the feeling of deeper understanding of dogs once you have a dog as an adult. She then does some minor research on dogs and communication but from her description she doesn't get very far. I don't think this is a good sign.

In chapters 5 and 6, Hunger describes the process of conditioning Stella to three buttons: outside, play and water. What frustrates me is that she describes so much communication that Stella is doing.

It amazed me how intentional her communication was, even from this starting point. She did not push a button and walk away. She expressed her desire to go outside first through her bark, eye contact, and pacing next to the button. Then she advanced from using gestures to a word right in front of my eyes.

This is empathically not Stella "using a word" in the way Hunger means. This is a very basic example of the ABC model. All of Stella's behaviours as well as Hunger's button-pushing are the antecedent, Hunger opening the door is the behaviour, and the consequence is that Stella goes outside. This is excellent communication, but it's not evidence of a dog "speaking".

And how is this not enough already? Why do you need the dog to also press the button? Stella knows what outside means. Her also pressing the button does not change the functionality of the word "outside" to either her or Hunger.

Maybe this is why there was no research on dogs using AAC. Maybe the similarities between dogs’ and humans’ language capabilities stop here, at understanding words and communicating concepts with gestures.

I'm not suggesting that doing further research isn't worthwhile, but the entire premise here from Hunger is flawed in my opinion. She is coming to this only from a speech therapy angle. That is, speech therapy for humans. There seems to be no real consideration for the dog's biological reality. The focus is entirely human-centric. We use words, so getting the dog to use words feels natural. But why should it be?

After weeks spent talking to Stella, modeling words, and observing her communication patterns, that night, for the first time, she and I spoke the same language.

This drives me up the wall. Hunger and Stella have actually already been speaking the same language and that is a human–dog language that has been developed over the last ~30 000 years. This is a result of the co-evolution of our species! To suggest that none of that is as important as the dog learning to use a button that says a human word is honestly maddening to me.

I knew in my heart and in my head that I was witnessing something fascinating with Stella. If anything, my coworkers’ confusion showed me how far our field still needed to come. I hoped someday I could be part of a movement toward more understanding and acceptance of AAC for all who need it, even dogs.

The gall to write something like this but to have shown very little inclination to do any kind of real immersion in research of dog behaviour or body language. To have shown no interest in existing dog training and dog communication. To frame everything through the human-centric lens of speech therapy. To back up statements only with references to child development research. This is like the ultimate example of anthropomorphism.

AAC is for people with impairments related to spoken and written language. It is for humans to help other humans communicate in a species-appropriate way, to bridge connections where connection may have been lost. Dogs, actually, don't need AAC. They need humans to make more of an effort to meet them halfway and pay attention to the huge amounts of communication they already do.

[mspattycake]

Loving this personalized cowgirl doggy bandana made with love ! Dm to order your custom doggy bandana-$20 🦮 🦴 🐕‍🦺 #mspattycake #mspattycakemakes #dog #dogstuff #dogbandana #pink #customdoggear #bandana #stella #dallasmaker #customdogbandana (at Dallas, Texas) https://www.instagram.com/p/Coh8w_1OBwz/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[furryfriend101]

Far More Shade has $100 kennel packs for multi dog homes with 6-10 of one size or multiple sizes.