B.A.A.R.C.™ In Action
My dog, Chloe, and I have been using the Behavior Analytic Approach to Relational Communication™ (BAARC) for about a year as of this writing (3.25.24). I was never skeptical of this approach; my background in learning and development had me 100% bought in from the first time I heard about BAARC. It fully aligned with everything I knew about how we learn and what matters in coping with (dis)stress. Nonetheless, I have been continually surprised - and often humbled - at what I have learned about Chloe’s preferences and needs from using BAARC with her.
I had been working with Chloe on dog and human reactive behaviors for about a year prior to implementing BAARC. That was long enough to have done a nerd-tastic deep dive into behavior science and training concepts, but not so long that my opinions were fully formed. In hindsight, I think my background paired with that timing put me in a sweet spot where I knew enough to grasp the science behind BAARC and to see that it is different from other methods, but I was not so invested in those other methods as to be resistant to the ways BAARC differs.
That is not to say that I did everything right! Below is a selection of videos of my journey implementing BAARC with Chloe as a dog guardian. Watching now, I see many places in my early videos where I missed her communicative gestures - whether because I just simply missed them or because I was operating on assumptions about what she wanted; honestly, there’s a bit of both. Fortunately, neither party has to be perfect. This system is resilient to missteps because any given interaction is one piece of a larger conversation, so missing a gesture is not the end of the conversation; it’s similar to when we ask a question and the person doesn’t hear us. The conversation doesn’t end there, we simply ask again.
April 10, 2023 - First Session
This video covers Chloe and I’s first steps into BAARC. I had read through the self-paced course and had waited and waited to get started because I thought it would take a long time to teach and implement. In reality, we spent about 15-30 minutes going through the first few steps to establish the mands that make up the foundations of the system (ready to move, moving forward, turning around). I took Chloe outside right after this session, watched in awe as she used the system flawlessly, and have never looked back.
April 14 - Day Four
At this early stage, I was still using standard management techniques relatively frequently, whenever there were moments I believed Chloe couldn’t handle. These days, Chloe has gestures for specific things that help her cope in stressful moments, and she has generated several of those options on her own. We could not have jumped right to that point, we had to learn to communicate and I had to learn to trust her to identify her own needs in moments of stress. The system scaffolds for that process. Relying on standard interventions doesn’t interrupt the process while it’s taking root and developing, which provides the handler a safety net in overwhelming situations. I never felt a loss of control, even as I gave more and more control to Chloe.
April 17 - One Week In
One of my favorite moments to share with people is toward the end of this video, around the 1:20 mark. I had briefly taken over the walk, turning Chloe away from her chosen path to avoid a trigger, then had figuratively handed the reigns back to her, and was waiting for her to choose our next steps. I finally realized her choice hadn’t changed, she wanted to go back the way she had originally chosen. It seems she had not perceived that route as being available to her until I stepped back, at which point her body language changed significantly and she turned us right around. For those who believe their dog is already leading their walks or that a dog will go whichever way the dog wants to, this moment is an excellent demonstration of rule governed behavior and why we cannot assume our dogs know the options available to them.
April 19 - My All-Time Favorite BAARC Moment
This video captured the first time Chloe generated her own mand and management strategy, and it was also a sweet moment for the two of us - made even sweeter because she created it. Now, almost a full year later, Chloe often comes to a stop and stands still, requesting that we pull over and watch the world go by for a bit. Equally as often, she sits down, requesting that I come down to her level and sit there with her - this is particularly common when there is a big or sudden noise, but also happens in response to more typical triggers (people + dogs). Sometimes it happens seemingly just because. Given the common advice to never let your dog watch a trigger or to place very strict, short limits on how long they can look at a trigger, I don’t think I would have arrived at either of these strategies without Chloe’s guidance. Judging by frequency, they are clearly two of her most valued strategies, and I’m so glad we have them.
March 2024 - A Year In
Two significant developments in how we use BAARC a year in are that our use of the system has become conversational rather than procedural, and my understanding of no choice moments has changed considerably. The first video below is my attempt at showing how conversational we are now. Having a deeper understanding of body language than I did a year ago, I can see where someone might watch this and not understand how a system is at work at all. However, going back to the moment from week one where Chloe didn’t turn me around until I explicitly opened that door for her (along with many, many moments since then), I am confident that Chloe knows all of her options for navigating the world, knows how to communicate them to me, and understands my responses to her requests. I think it’s very difficult, if not impossible, to be confident in those statements without instilling contrived, mutually understood, direct communication. Relying on body language alone places us as observer-interpreters, rather than listeners.
As for no choice moments, I rarely think of things that way anymore. Instead, a single no is a brief moment in a continuing conversation, and there is almost never a full absence of choice. When I say no to one option, I say no to that one option, and Chloe generates her own ideas about what’s next. In contrast, I used to say no and then determine the direction we would go next and for how long before I might stop to let Chloe sniff.
Final Thoughts
A year of using BAARC with my own dog has taught me just how much we assume about what our canine companions need and want. I see this pattern repeated with clients and their dogs, too. What our dogs request varies from day to day, just as our preferences do, and they can handle decision-making under stress, just like we can — as long as they and we are properly supported in doing so.
This not to say we can never take over. Sometimes we will, for safety reasons or because we have competing needs, or for lots of other valid reasons. But our threshold for intervening can become much higher as we learn to trust our animals, and it seems reasonable to conclude that we will probably intervene more effectively based on the information gathered while observing patterns in their choices.
If you would like to see the entire video collection of Chloe and I’s journey with BAARC, the full set of videos is available on TikTok.
