Training Parrot: Patterning Happy InteractionsWhen training parrot you will learn that all behavior is a series of habits. A well-adjusted human or bird engages in many diverse habitual activities. A compulsive or poorly adjusted human or bird might repeatedly engage in the same, sometimes unhealthy, habit repeatedly. Habits are formed when incidental, random, or spontaneously occurring behavior is repeated. Because a parrot has a will of its own and something resembling a can opener attached to the front of its face, spontaneous behaviors involving the beak will be common. The first question new parrot owners usually ask is, "What do I do if my bird bites me? Punishments and Bird Behavior Modification Because they are so much like surrogate children, it is easy to fall into behavioral interactions with companion birds that we experienced when we were children. If a particular human has seen only punishment as a socialization process, it is easy for that human to at least consider using that type of socialization process on a bird. When I was a youngster, many decent, docile, well-meaning people disciplined their children and their pets with a leather belt. Corporal punishment was sometimes used even to assist in potty training both children and puppies. As a child of my parents' generation, when I first began writing about socializing birds, I was not immune to the punishment-to-deter-behavior schools of thought. Although I knew better than to advocate hitting or squirting a bird as punishment, I was not above the use of time-outs as a response to unwanted behavior. And although I have seen time-outs work many times and never cause harm in over twenty years of observations, I am aware that a bird might have a bad reaction to this technique. I have also learned that there are better and faster ways to modify bird behavior. Things have changed. We now know that adults who were hit as children are more likely to hit others.
We now train puppies by keeping them in den-like crates until it is time to go to the potty-approved area. It is easier. It works more quickly. We now know that any punishments are inappropriate as tools for the modification of behavior in companion birds. Although punishments when training parrot may sometimes initially appear to work, the dangers of punishments used against birds far outweigh possible benefits. The physical dangers of squirting a bird with a stream of water include potential complications from water forced into sinuses or aspirated into air sacks and injuries from falling, flying, or thrashing. There are also behavioral dangers. A bird that is punished with a squirt of water is in danger of developing fear or resentment toward humans, overall nervousness, feather chewing, and an aversion to bathing (one of the few ways a companion bird has of burning off excess energy). These behavioral complications can be observed as direct responses to squirting, or they may be reflected in more subtle reactions that don't show up until later. Birds that are thumped on the beak or dropped are in danger of physical injuries as well as adverse behavioral reactions. A sensitive bird that is punished with time-outs might develop phobic or self-mutilating behaviors. Additionally, a bird punished with painful or frightening techniques is not learning peaceful cooperative behavior. Like human children, a bird that is punished is probably more likely to return aggression or to express annoyance later. Many parrots—especially cocktoos, Amazons, greys, and Poicephalus—are just as likely to react later as they are to react immediately. Therefore, rather than when training parrot and punishing them, we guide them to cooperate by stimulating them to revert to planned and practiced behavioral patterns. |
