Given that we developed the AutoTrainer nearly 26 years ago, I find it surprising that only recently, (largely due to feedback from dog owners and trainers), we have discovered that the device is extremely effective for the rehabilitation of dogs with severe separation anxiety.
We designed the AutoTrainer to reduce recreational barking and other vocalizations, which it does extremely effectively, as evidenced by reviewing the barking history and plotting the decrease in number of barks per day. Our original research showed that in addition to reducing barking, the dogs paced less and spent more time lying down, usually very close to the AutoTrainer, which of course, all makes sense because that’s where the food rewards are delivered. At the time, my co-inventor, (a developmental psychologist with a recent interest in dog cognition), remarked that he felt that our test shelter dogs were “attaching” to the machine — bonding — pretty much like Harry Harlow’s isolation-reared monkeys that, in the absence of their real mothers, attached (both physically and psychologically) to a metal wire frame (surrogate “mother”) covered in terry cloth.
The Harlow experiments dramatically underscored the beyond-crucial importance of early experience, especially hugging and handling to prevent severe mental trauma and behavior problems. Given the choice between food and a wire frame to hug, the motherless baby monkeys chose the wire frame. I recently reread the Harlow research papers and found the results to be extremely disturbing in the same way that I find it really sad that our test dogs appeared to be bonding with a machine! But I guess this only advertises just how desperately lonely and stressed some dogs are when left at home alone.