Handler beliefs affect scent detection dog outcomes (2011)
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Handler beliefs affect scent detection dog outcomes (2011)
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Re: Handler beliefs affect scent detection dog outcomes (2011)
#2Well it is not far fetched that they can smell the excitement or anxiety of their owners as they approach the evidence they believe is the correct one?
Re: Handler beliefs affect scent detection dog outcomes (2011)
#3I only read an excerpt of the article, but it seems to me that it might be tough to attribute the false detection to a certain variable within the animal's cognition. Is it perception of human behavior, mental state, tone of voice, owner's scent or maybe even some Pavlov effect on picking out cases that are certainly positive?
However, this obviously has some interesting implications in court cases or situations where a traveller might be falsely accused of drug traffic, or when suspect X is 'randomly' selected for checks.
Re: Handler beliefs affect scent detection dog outcomes (2011)
#4Well it is not far fetched that they can smell the excitement or anxiety of their owners as they approach the evidence they believe is the correct one?
> For scent detection dog handlers, beliefs that scent is present might result in either sufficient inadvertent postural and facial cues so that dogs will respond regardless of the absence of scent
I don't know how good dogs are at pose detection, but it's definitely plausible that they can tell when an alert is expected.
Re: Handler beliefs affect scent detection dog outcomes (2011)
#5Well it is not far fetched that they can smell the excitement or anxiety of their owners as they approach the evidence they believe is the correct one?
They can probably smell their handler getting interested well before the handler's consciously even aware of it.
Re: Handler beliefs affect scent detection dog outcomes (2011)
#6I've heard this mentioned a few years ago in a TV report on dogs used in labs that test evidence for criminal trials. Their procedure was to let the dog alone into a special scent-free room that contained the sample being tested, plus a few control ones. The samples were placed into containers that only let the smell out (no visual cues, even though the samples were identical-looking cotton swabs).
Also, I vaguely remember a high-profile case where the evidence was dismissed precisely because the procedures for gathering and testing the samples were not followed.
Re: Handler beliefs affect scent detection dog outcomes (2011)
#7The observation seems logical, but I wonder what is actually the relevance of the study in practice.
I mean, there are three common situations where these dogs are used:
1) airports, stations, traffic stops etc. where the influence of the trainer might be relevant (i.e. the trainer, even if involuntarily, may influence the dog if the person that is sniffed - or their belongings/looks/behaviours/etc. - look suspicuous to the trainer)
2) search in buildings for drugs or explosives
3) screening of mail, packages, containers, etc.
I believe that among these only in activity #1 the trainer might have some pre-constituted suspect that would "trigger" the influence on the dog.
But in any case the dogs are only used as a means of "triage" of sorts, so at the most this influence leading to false positives will cause some time wasted.
Still in case #1 (and possibly in case #3) the issue might be that if there are too many of these false positives, while the attention of the trainers/policemen is drawn to the "false target" some other one (actually carrying drugs or explosives) will "go through".
Re: Handler beliefs affect scent detection dog outcomes (2011)
#8The observation seems logical, but I wonder what is actually the relevance of the study in practice. I mean, there are three common situations where these dogs are used: 1) airports, stations, traffic stops etc. where the influence of the trainer might be relevant (i.e. the trainer, even if involuntarily, may influence the dog if the person that is sniffed - or their belongings/looks/behaviours/etc. - look suspicuous…
I have heard the term "search warrant on four legs".
In many jurisdictions, including the US, police officers are not allowed to search anybody or their cars, even if they are black.
So if the dog learns to please his handler by indicating contraband, they have a chance to at best inconvenience anyone they (dis)like.
Re: Handler beliefs affect scent detection dog outcomes (2011)
#9Well it is not far fetched that they can smell the excitement or anxiety of their owners as they approach the evidence they believe is the correct one?
> For scent detection dog handlers, beliefs that scent is present might result in either sufficient inadvertent postural and facial cues so that dogs will respond regardless of the absence of scent I don't know how good dogs are at pose detection, but it's definitely plausible that they can tell when an alert is expected.
A less subtle cue would be how they treat the "suspect".
It's less about the handler's pheromones and more about movement, speech and posture.
Re: Handler beliefs affect scent detection dog outcomes (2011)
#10Well it is not far fetched that they can smell the excitement or anxiety of their owners as they approach the evidence they believe is the correct one?
They can probably smell their handler getting interested well before the handler's consciously even aware of it.
I doubt that, at least in the literal sense of smelling.
Dogs can however distinguish behavior patterns in their handlers, because that's mainly how they get rewards and are punished.
Both the patterns and the rewards are much more subtle than handlers are generally aware of. A service dog is in some sense the worst case of an overfitting machine learning model you can imagine.