Timberlake's Behaviour Systems

Looking differently at action & motivation

As time passes, the work of a quiet scholar from Indiana University becomes more and more sensible. Professor William Timberlake is not a name known in dog training circles, though he should be. Much more so than Coppinger. If I ever find the person or people who popularised Coppinger, I might be tempted to do some quite horrible damage to them. It’s unspeakable almost that in this day and age, we’re all still stuck with some loose, un-evidenced biological-racism-adjacent theory that everyone talks about as if it’s the Gospel According To Dogs.

One of those names still graces animal behaviour textbooks for undergraduates studying ethology. It isn’t Coppinger’s.

One of those names still graces dog behaviour courses, papers, research and textbooks for undergraduates studying dogs. It isn’t Timberlake’s.

There’s a weird fact for you.

Say Coppinger’s name to a class full of animal behaviour scientists and you’ll get blank looks. Say Timberlake’s to a dog trainer or canine behaviourist who doesn’t have a BSc in animal behaviour more generally, and you’ll get blank looks.

As you might be able to tell, I vote we get off the Coppinger bus (a little) and we get on the Timberlake bus (a lot).

That’s very relevant in today’s society where dog trainers seem to think that a lot of canine behaviour is mindless, automatic, unreinforceable, biological, innate, instinctive or unlearned.

While both men were writing in the 1980s and 90s, Coppinger’s theories seem increasingly more dated (can we throw them in the bin yet?) and Timberlake’s increasingly more relevant.

In fact, Timberlake’s behaviour systems theory is perhaps even more relevant than it ever was in the way it unites biology, ethology, ecology, movement sciences, behaviour, respondent conditioning and operant conditioning. It’s a framework that fits us all. All-encompassing, one might say. It brings them all back together again.

No wonder it’s so popular in animal science as a whole.

Will you find him written about by the dog folk stuck in the 1940s?

No. No you will not.

Should you?

I’d argue that we absolutely should if we want to drag ourselves by the bootstraps into the 21st century.

Shall we dig in?