Learn what Drives a Pets Behaviour
Understanding pet behaviour makes life much easier for owners, those who work with animals and the pets themselves!
This course provides you with an understanding of animals and what causes them to act the way they do. This provides an important foundation to being able to manage animal behaviour in a variety of situations.
Why Choose this Course?
1. It is Substantial - Our 100 hour courses provide comprehensive and varied learning materials and strategies.
2. Students have Strong Support - Our tutors are accessible, industry professionals, committed to supporting your learning!
3. Courses re continuously assessed, revised and updated to ensure accurate, contemporary information.
True learning is a process. Our teaching staff are a team of experts, spread across the world, all university trained and with real world experience.
Our goal is your learning. We remain committed to providing you with the best learning experience possible!
Lesson Structure
There are 8 lessons in this course:
-
Introduction: Influences and Motivation
-
Ethology
-
What is behaviour
-
Purpose of animal behaviour
-
What motivates behaviours
-
Behaviour types (Reactive, Active, Cognitive)
-
Learned behaviours (Classic conditioning, Reinforcement, Extinction, Operant Conditioning, Skinners experiments)
-
Other influences (external stimuli, internal stimuli, physiological responses, psychological responses)
-
Terminology
-
Observing animals
-
Genetics and Behaviour
-
Understanding basics of genetics
-
Terminology (eg. alleles, allelomorphs, genes,phenotype, mitosis, homozygous, genotype, etc)
-
Environmental affect
-
Heritability
-
Epigenesis
-
Innate behaviour
-
Interaction between different species
-
Survival
-
Case study : Inherited traits in horse behaviour
-
Animal Perception and Behaviour
-
Animal communication and perception
-
How animals perceive things
-
Imprinting
-
Types of stimuli; Visual, Auditory, Tactile, Chemical
-
Monocular and binocular vision
-
Terminology
-
Neural control
-
Behaviour and the Environment
-
Orthokinesis
-
Klinokinesis
-
Navigation
-
Homeostasis
-
Thermoregulation
-
Motivation
-
Biological Clocks
-
Biological clocks
-
Sun Compass
-
Migration
-
Tolerance
-
Acclimatisation
-
Hibernation
-
Sexual and Reproductive behaviours
-
Social Behaviour
-
Animal societies
-
Aggression
-
Fight or flight response
-
Social constraints
-
Sexual behaviour
-
Social order
-
Bonding
-
Courtship
-
Territorial behaviour
-
Feeding
-
Vocalisations
-
Case Studies; birds, dogs
-
Terminology
-
Instinct and Learning
-
Shaping
-
Extinction and habituation
-
Instrumental learning
-
Thorndyke's Law of Effect
-
Operant and respondent behaviour
-
Biological aspects of learning
-
Cognition
-
Associative learning
-
Case studies: early learning in dogs, early learning in cats
-
Comparative intelligence
-
Handling Animals
-
Domestication of animals
-
Problems Handling animals
-
Psychological affects of different handling techniques
-
Preventing problems with pets
-
Training animals (examples: birds, rabbits, horses, cattle etc).
-
Terminology
-
The student has a choice of which types of animals to focus on, though a variety will still be covered
-
Behavioural Problems
-
Abnormal behaviour (eg. psychotic, neurotic)
-
Domestication of animals
-
Diagnosing behaviour
-
Psychotic disorders
-
Case study; behavioural problems with cats; various types of aggression and other problems
-
Training cats
-
Case study; aggression and other problems with dogs
-
Training dogs
-
Case study; behavioural problems with pigs
-
Terminology
Each lesson culminates in an assignment which is submitted to the school, marked by the school's tutors and returned to you with any relevant suggestions, comments, and if necessary, extra reading.
Aims
-
Identify factors affecting animal behaviour.
-
Describe the influence of genes on animal behaviour.
-
Explain how animals perceive and how they respond to various stimuli.
-
Explain the influence of environment factors, such as circadian rhythms, on biological clocks, reproductive cycles, orientation and other animal behaviours.
-
Explain the social influences on animal aggression, play, sexual behaviour, communication and other behaviours.
-
Describe different ways that animals learn (such as conditioning and habituation) and some effects of learning on behaviour.
-
Discuss psychological implications of different handling techniques.
-
Identify abnormal animal behaviour (eg. psychotic, neurotic behaviour) and ways to reduce dependence on humans.
What Pet Is Best?
Choosing a pet is a significant decision!
Your pet must suit your living style and home situation.
Consider:
- Some pets cost a lot more to keep than others.
- Some pets may affect your lifestyle (particularly indoor pets). Who will care for them when you holiday? Are you up for the extra cleaning?
- Some types of pets require more interaction, time, affection, etc., than others.
While many behaviours can be influenced through training, it is essential to consider the characteristics of the pet and breed you're thinking of bringing into your care.
Managing animals starts with understanding them!
It is important to understand the basis for behaviour before attempting to change it!
Consider the interesting example of cats -
We want cats to catch and kill vermin; but we don't want them to attack protected wildlife or other pets. Overall, cats don't differentiate between a mouse and a small native mammal.
We may want cats to stay around our home; but it is in their DNA to prowl wider afield. They are built to climb, run, pounce and perform all sorts of behaviours suited to outdoor, predatory life!
So cats are natural hunters. However, this can cause distress to owners and generally does not promote preservation of biodiversity. Accordingly, understanding what drives cat behaviour can help us establish ways of keeping cats and humans happy!
Some cats appear to hunt more than they need. It has been suggested that ensuring the cat has enough to eat will stop them from hunting However, hunger and hunting do not appear to be related in cats. Some experts believe this is because cats require variety in their diet, so they are motivated to hunt, even just after eating their prey. But should we and can we stop a cat killing prey?
The most efficient way to do this is to keep cats indoors. When kept indoors, owners must ensure provision of sufficient indoor exercise, mental stimulation, exposure to sunlight, fresh air and more.
If the cat is not kept inside, owners might try walking them on a lead or build an outdoor enclosure.
It can be very hard to prevent a cat from hunting, so it has been suggested that owners can approach this in a different way – rather than trying to change the cat’s behaviour, change the prey’s behaviour:
- Do no put out bird tables or baths or anything that entices birds to the garden.
- Keep deterrent devices that scare away birds
- Put a bell on the cat’s collar, so prey can hear it coming
- Get a collar with a sonic alert. This mimics a bird’s alarm call.
- Keep the garden open so cats have fewer places to hide and wildlife and see cats easier.
HOW CAN THIS COURSE HELP YOU?
This course can help you:
- Learn to manage dogs, cats and other animals as pets or working animals
- Help train working animals (e.g., support animals, detection animals, working dogs, etc.)
- Get a job in a kennel, pet shop, on a farm or elsewhere
- Start a business helping people with their animals (animal training, grooming, dog walking, etc.)
- Volunteer at an animal shelter or charity; getting experience and laying a foundation for a career change.
WHY CHOOSE THIS COURSE?
Learn your own way, with flexibility in place, time and pace.
Receive prompt, friendly and supportive guidance as needed throughout your studies from our expert tutors and industry professionals.
Enjoy and take hold of your future through studying what you want in a way that suits you!
ENROL or Use our FREE Course Advice Service to Connect with a Tutor