Most people who work with dogs love them and don’t want to cause them harm—only a sadist would want to hurt dogs. As our understanding of how dogs learn and what motivates them has grown, the training world has shifted away from correction-heavy methods, like the Koehler Method, toward more compassionate frameworks such as LIMA or R+ (all-positive) training.
What is LIMA Dog Training?
LIMA stands for least intrusive minimally aversive. We’ll explain the meaning of intrusive and aversive in this post. We’ll also explain how LIMA differs from all-positive training.
How Dogs Learn
A key concept in dog training is that dogs will tend to do what they find pleasant or interesting, and they will avoid things they find unpleasant. Operant conditioning aligns with that concept by describing how conscious acts or behaviors can be made more or less likely to occur.
Operant conditioning was first developed by B.F. Skinner and links behaviors to their consequences, using reinforcement to make the behavior more likely to happen again and punishment to make it less likely to happen again. The method either adds (positive) a pleasant or unpleasant consequence or takes away or subtracts (negative) a pleasant or unpleasant consequence.
Thus, reinforcement can be either positive (giving the dog something it wants, like a treat) or negative (taking away an unpleasant sensation, like a tight leash). In the same way, punishment can be positive (e.g. the dog is given a leash correction) or negative (a treat the dog wants is withheld).
What is Meant by Punishment, Reinforcement, Positive, Negative
Operant conditioning does not tell us everything there is to know about how dogs (and humans) learn, but we can use it to understand what is meant by key terms in dog training.
Reinforcement – an action taken to encourage a behavior to happen again
Punishment – an action taken to discourage a behavior from happening again
Positive – either a pleasant or unpleasant stimulus is given or added
Negative – either a pleasant or unpleasant stimulus is taken away or withheld
What Do Dog Trainers Mean by Minimally Aversive?
In dog training the word aversive applies to an unpleasant stimulus that could be used in dog training. If you’re my age, you might remember your parents hitting your dog with a rolled-up newspaper for bad behavior. The idea was that the paper wasn’t hard enough to actually hurt the dog, but the experience was meant to be unpleasant. This is a good example of an aversive stimulus. It also demonstrates an intent to avoid cruelty, which is what LIMA is about today.
Obviously, there is a range in the severity of aversive practices from electric shock and prong collars (which can cause pain) to a tight leash that creates discomfort around the throat but isn’t really painful. LIMA seeks to minimize aversive methods but recognizes that those that aren’t cruel could still be appropriate under the right circumstances.
How Could Dog Training be Intrusive?
Actions that negatively impact a dog’s sense of well-being are called intrusive. Canine Companions describes two types of intrusions in their team training textbook.
Physical intrusions violate a dog’s sense of personal space. Examples include:
- Pushing the dog
- Pulling the dog
- Dragging the dog on a leash
- Tight leashing
- Hovering over the dog
Psychological intrusions violate a dog’s sense of mental well-being, such as:
- Negative emotional output from the handler (anger, frustration)
- Actions designed to elicit fear in the dog (threatening to hit the dog, etc.)
- Repeating cues
- Frequent, ineffective leash corrections
- Not rewarding the dog’s responsiveness
My parents felt hitting a dog with a rolled-up newspaper was humane because it was not meant to be painful, only alarming. However, we wouldn’t use this method today because of its emotional impact on the dog.
What’s the Difference Between LIMA and All-Positive (R+) Training?
Some service dog trainers advocate all-positive training. This is sometimes called R+ because positive reinforcement (the R+ quadrant in the operant training figure) is emphasized over the other three quadrants. In practice, punishment is still used. For example, if a trainer gave a puppy the ‘down’ cue and she pawed at the trainer’s leg rather than lying down, she would withhold the treat the puppy wants. This is negative punishment, because the treat is withheld to discourage the pawing behavior.
LIMA also emphasizes positive reinforcement (R+), but trainers and handlers consider a range of factors affecting the dog in the moment (like the dog’s health, the training environment, training antecedents, etc.) known as the humane hierarchy. I won’t go into the details of the humane hierarchy in this post. Instead, I’d like to offer some examples of when punishment and intrusive acts are both humane and appropriate.
Examples of When Punishment or Intrusions Might be Used in LIMA
- When your 8-month-old puppy jumps on you for attention (dogs find pets very rewarding). You don’t pet her (negative punishment) and instead ignore her until she calms down. Your actions are not cruel and do not hurt the dog.
- If your dog grabs a dead bird during a walk, you assertively remove it from his mouth. This is a physical intrusion and positive punishment, and possibly negative punishment since he loses what he wants. The action is appropriate as it protects his health without causing harm and might discourage him from doing it again.
- If your dog pulls on the leash to reach a fire hydrant he wants to sniff, you plant your feet and do not allow forward movement until the leash is loose. This is negative punishment, because you are discouraging the behavior (pulling) by withholding what the dog wants (forward movement)
Why Is LIMA Used in Service Dog Training?
LIMA training is the standard for all service dog organizations accredited by Assistance Dogs International. This makes sense, because a service dog team is a partnership based on trust. My service dog, Koogle, trusts me completely when I trim his nails or clean his ears, because he knows I won’t hurt him. I might not be able to maintain that trust if I were using harsh, aversive methods in our training sessions, but I do take intrusive or aversive actions when they are appropriate. I will sometimes rebuke him by sharply saying “don’t”, or I might need to remove something from his mouth. (He is ¾ Labrador retriever, after all.) But I will never take an action to cause pain or create fear.
In Summary
LIMA is a humane framework for service dog training that prioritizes the dog’s well-being and trust while allowing for necessary, minimally aversive interventions when appropriate. By focusing on positive reinforcement and minimizing both physical and psychological intrusions, LIMA helps build a strong, respectful partnership between handler and dog. This approach not only supports effective learning but also ensures that service dogs are trained with compassion and care.
What are your thoughts? Please leave a comment about this post or to let me know what other content you’d like to see in this blog.
