Field Guide · Glossary
LIMA
Methods and protocolsLeast Intrusive, Minimally Aversive: a professional standard requiring that the least intrusive effective option be used to achieve a training goal.
How it works
It is a decision rule rather than a list of banned techniques. A practitioner working to it is expected to be competent across the range of options, to try less intrusive approaches first, and to be able to show why anything more intrusive was necessary. It does not prohibit positive punishment outright, which is a common misreading in both directions: some read it as force-free and others dismiss it as meaningless. What it requires is that intrusiveness is justified rather than defaulted to.
What it looks like
A practitioner facing a counter-surfing dog clears the counters, reinforces settling on a mat, and only then considers anything further. The order is what the standard asks for, and being able to explain that order is part of it.
Commonly confused with
- Humane Hierarchy
- LIMA is the principle. The Humane Hierarchy is the ordered list of procedures that makes it applicable, by defining which options count as less intrusive.
Related terms