Dog Training Discussion: Let's address one of the most frequent critiques of Force Free training

Let's address one of the most frequent critiques of Force Free training: The dog has to "want the treat more" than they want any current distraction in the environment, and since this is not always true, FF training will always fail.

People have a really hard time understanding why this is not true, so I'll use an example in humans that we all intuitively understand more easily. We can then relate this to dog training in another post. For this post, please focus on how this works in human children.

Let's say you're planning a trip to Disney World with your 9-year-old kid. The kid's been out in the world, of course. He has been in line at the grocery store and the bank. Even little carnivals with rides in your hometown. You're a good dad, so you always give a little low-key positive reinforcement: "Good job being patient, buddy. I know lines are boring."

But your kid is way more excited about Space Mountain. All of his friends have been on the ride and think it's great. Your kid has been talking about the ride for weeks.

Obviously, he wants to ride on Space Mountain much more than he wants your, "Good job, buddy."

So? Kid's going to try to cut the line and run right to the gate, so he can be the next rider of Space Mountain. Right?

I would love to hear everyone's ideas about why the kid will or won't try to cut the line.

A question to consider:

Does it even matter how the child was trained to not cut the line? Spanked when he tried, grabbed by an arm and brought back to the line to be released only when he stops pulling, removing an item he wants at the grocery store if he doesn't comply, giving him little cookies for staying in line, offering to play "I Spy" with him if he waits in line, etc.?

Does the training method really matter? Hundreds of kids waiting in line at Disney World every day. Surely they have been "trained" by all of the above methods and more.

Why are we, as a society, so consistently good at training children (and adults) to wait in line?