Susan G. Friedman, PhD
Susan G. Friedman, Ph.D., began her career in applied behavior analysis working with children with severe behavior
disorders. More recently, she has pioneered efforts to apply to captive animals the scientifically sound teaching
technology and standards for best practices that have been so effective with human learners. Dr. Friedman was
appointed to the federal California Condor Recovery Team and frequently collaborates with field biologists,
veterinarians, animal trainers, zoo keepers, and pet owners regarding behavior analysis solutions to the animal
behavior problems they encounter. is a psychology professor at Utah State University. An applied behaviorist for
more than 25 years, her area of expertise is learning and behavior, with a special emphasis on children’s behavior
disorders. Prior to living in Utah, Susan was a professor at the University of Colorado after which she lived in
Lesotho, Africa for 5 years. While there, she directed the first American School of Lesotho.

Susan has written on the topic of learning and behavior for two avian veterinary texts (in press) and popular parrot
magazines. Several articles can be found on the web at http://www.parrotsfirst.org . She co-teaches animal behavior
workshops with Steve Martin at his ranch facility (see http://www.naturalencounters.com) and zoos around the
country, speaks at bird clubs and conferences, and enjoys contributing to and learning from several companion parrot
behavior internet lists. Susan is a core member of the California Condor Recovery Team.

Dr. Friedman also teaches an online class in behavior. This ListServ course is designed to teach participants how
parrots learn. The focus is on analyzing the ways in which the caregiver’s interactions and environmental
arrangements maintain existing problem behaviors and how more adaptive behaviors can be taught through the use of
positive reinforcement. By understanding the fundamental principles of learning and behavior and the associated
teaching technology, caregivers can facilitate successful parrot behaviors for lasting companionship.

The philosophy of behavior in this course is that parrots, like all learners, must have power to operate positively
on their environment to live behaviorally healthy lives. We facilitate this power when we interact with them in such
a way that they choose to do what is required for lasting companionship in our homes. The guideline followed for
matching problems to solutions is to always select the most positive, least intrusive effective interventions. To
change our parrot’s behavior we first change what we do. Students will quickly learn that once one has the necessary
tools, a commitment to facilitate behavior rather than force it does not mean a loss of behavioral compliance.

A natural science perspective guides the information presented here which means that our challenge is to explain
behavioral phenomena by identifying the physical events that produce them. Students are encouraged to focus on
observable behavior and the environmental elements that support it, rather than inferences or assumptions about
hypothetical mental mechanisms. The lectures rely heavily on the findings of many decades of scientific study of
behavior across many different species of learners as personal recipe knowledge is not the only psychology we need
to provide a high quality of life to our parrots.

Sign-up for Dr Friedman's Living and Learning With Parrots (LLP) class can be accessed at www.behaviorworks.org . 
I believe there is a waiting list so do not delay in signing up.

Associated with this course is an email list called Parrot Behavior Analysis Solutions (PBAS). You are welcome to
join that work group to further your experience with the material and to help others learn it as well. It is an open
list where LLP students as well as others who have not taken LLP can work on behavior solutions together. Go to the
following site http://groups.yahoo.com/groups/ParrotBAS/join  for more information and to sign up to join the PBAS
list.

When asked how she became interested in working with companion parrots in particular, Susan explains with a wink, "I have always enjoyed working with juvenile delinquents!"

Here is Dr. Friedman's Recommended reading list for the LLP class.