What you are saying here is not true at all. A dog (or a horse) must have the nerve first, by hereditary means, before they can handle certain pressures. If they don't have the nerve to tolerate loud sudden noises they are "washed". Out of the program, no more time put into them, especially for military or police work or social or service work. And if it's a pet, I've personally seen years put into trying to fix noise phobias with little to no changes. Nerve, or lack of, is deep seated in genetics. This is exactly what temperament tests are made for. Not for gun dogs or hunting dogs, it's just testing nerve. Every dog is allowed to startle, it's recovery they look for. Most Doberman handlers wanting to do the WAE have two reasons: for fun & curiosity or because the are show breeders but wanting to prove they have a well rounded dog. If the dog is socialized well and has solid nerves it should pass. Maybe they practice a bit with the boogy-man scene, maybe they don't. But if the dog doesn't run behind the handler when attacked, to me that shows good nerve. A weak dog would not overcome that surprise in a public outing. If a test was close by wouldn't you want to do it, just to learn more about your dog? It isn't saying a dog is better or not, it's just saying this is how your dog naturally reacts to various things.
You're talking about extremes of weak temperament. A stable Dobe should invariably have much stronger nerves than a typical horse. It takes an absolute wreck of a high-strung Dobe to have such poor temperament that it cannot be desensitized. It's that gap between "stable" and "may be effectively desensitized into being stable" that is causing problems.
As I mentioned, I think there's value for breeders and owners who are genuinely curious and diligent. It is a concerning situation (or should be) that only about 30% of Dobes seem to pass. I'm sure there's a decent percentage of almost-passes, but it's still a sorry statement when it's all looking at the basics.
There are varying scores for most exercises within the WAE. It isn't exactly solely a pass or fail either, here's your title. This can give breeders useful information, even if the dog fails. What if they passed everything exceptionally well but failed the umbrella recovery within x seconds? Would you not breed an exceptional dog everywhere else solely on that exercise alone or would you keep it in mind and maybe breed to a dog that had better startle recovery time.
There might be better choices, but I certainly don't think any form of elitism and gatekeeping is particularly helpful for purebreds, aside from the most obvious non-conformities and genetic defects. The only thing I'd maybe point out is that, if the DPCA wants to gatekeep on saying titles should be a necessity on the Reputable Breeder checklist, they should gatekeep temperament as well, and conduct things more like a ZTP qualification to even be eligible breeding stock in the studbook.
My rationale for that would be, if they're going to go in on promoting popular sire syndrome and throttling the gene pool, they should at least make sure any potentially popular sire has a rock-solid correct temperament and is suitable breeding stock for the breed as a whole, as is the goal of the ZTP.
I do wish the evaluation had to be taken twice by two different judges or observed by two different judges but WAEs can be hard to come by and it seems like evaluators even harder. My girl for example received a -1 for the friendly stranger. She wasn't aggressive or avoidant...she was actually pulling on the leash towards the person but then kept walking by instead of interacting with the person
. She simply was not interested in directly greeting the stranger which is acceptable for a doberman and why a -1 for that exercise is still a passing score. I personally think she was a zero but hey one person's interpretation gave her that score and I'm stuck with it. This where two evaluations would be nice. But then you remove the element of "they've done this before"
That wouldn't be a bad idea, since a lot of the evaluation is somewhat subjective. I'd also wonder if the judges might start out on one end of the lenient-harsh spectrum and drift towards the other as the day wears on. Some settings are probably less ideal for the test than others.
I want to be clear I'm not calling the test worthless if it's taken a second time, but that should probably be a hard limit on the number of WAE attempts permitted for receiving a WAC, if a dog can't pass in two attempts, I think that result speaks for itself, and I think it diminishes the value of the WAC if folks are taking it more than twice or training/desensitizing. I wonder how much this sort of thing is a problem in ZTP trials.
I agree with
@Ravenbird though, you can "practice" for the aggression part all you want. It will not suddenly make a skiddish dog forward and brave with strong nerve enough to warrant them receiving a 3 on the attack. I don't know how the club is to keep people from practicing for parts of the WAE before hand. There are people that will take advantage in all parts of life. Trialing on home field vs trying for national are two different kinds of pressure but it doesn't make the person that trialed on home fields accomplishment any less.
I would personally would like to see video of a dog's WAE if I was making banking my decision on that for breeding.
Perhaps taking video should be a standard part of WAE, and sent-out for a second, blind opinion or two before a final grade is issued. The time I did a WAE, I was there towards the end of the day, and my evaluator seemed distracted at times and not really completely present. I think they still were correct in their grading based on my observations of Kor's reactions, but for something like this, someone reviewing the big picture through a video, rather than being too close to the action and being in the moment might make it more objective.
Some techniques for preventing cheating by training to tests could be to have a random selection of challenges and to allow some latitude in mixing them up a little. For example, if evaluators could choose between a rattle can and a cordless vacuum (not to exceed a certain volume), or between a substantial variety of materials for unfamiliar footing, rather than only plastic sheeting and an ex pen on the ground, or the umbrella pop could also be someone flapping a garbage bag, it would be more of a surprise to everyone involved, as intended. I realize there's a fine line here in terms of standardization, but the whole point of the test is that there are potential surprises and observing how the dog reacts to new challenges and being startled by surprises.
Asha will get a go at it before long, and if she can stand the strangers I think she'll do fine.
