Imagine how frustrating it would be for you if you felt you were unable to ask for things. This is a frustration that people with autism can sometimes feel. Fortunately, manding training is used to help individuals with autism learn to overcome this challenge. Manding is a way for the autistic to ask for things. On a site run by an Autism specialist, there’s a page that goes into greater detail about what manding is:
Manding can also be taught to dogs
A dog can learn to mand at any age, and some dogs do so naturally. A dog who learns to mand, particularly from a young age, is often a happier, more relaxed dog. For dogs, manding usually comes in the form of a voluntary sit (I’ve met a few dogs who mand from a standing position, and I think that’s OK, too). If the sit is preceded by a cue from the handler, that is not a mand. A proper mand is offered by the dog, not asked for by the handler. The mental process to sit voluntarily is different for a dog than if asked to do so. What makes manding so beneficial for a dog is knowing that he or she can ask for things in a way that is acceptable to humans.
How to teach manding to a litter of puppies?
You’ll need a training clicker and some pea-sized hotdog pieces. Place the puppies in an ex-pen or similar arrangement where they can see you and you can reach them. Hold the clicker and treats behind your back. Each time a puppy puts his or her butt on the ground, click and treat. Don’t say sit, don’t say anything. Continue this for 3 or 4 minutes. You can conduct manding training multiple times per day. Within a few days, most if not all pups in the litter will be manding. I start manding training with a litter at around day 20, and continue it daily until the puppies go home.
Looking behind the curtain
By way of explanation, the process of training a dog to mand involves a clicker as a conditioned reinforcer (Pryor, 2019) and treats as primary reinforcement. With a puppy, manding training is valuable on at least two levels. First, the young puppy learns that to sit patiently in front of a human being is a rewarding experience. Second, the pup learns that he or she can offer behaviors and receive rewards. A puppy armed with this knowledge will use it throughout its life, offering both new and existing behaviors to please its handler.
References
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This work (A Canine Health Enrichment and Whelping Protocol, by the Old-fashioned Black & Tan English Shepherd Association) is free of known copyright restrictions.
