Shaping Naturally Occurring Dog Behavior
Anthony Johnson
Have you ever wanted to be a dolphin trainer? Now
here's your chance. See, this is what they do. They sit by the
pool side with a fish their hands. They wait patiently until the
dolphin does something they want - stick it's nose out of the
water, say. At that precise moment, they throw the fish. The dolphin
eats it.
Then they wait for the behavior to occur again. After
some time, the dolphin will get the idea that when it sticks it's
nose out of the water, a fish will come its way. There's then
only one thing left to do - link a signal into the process. So
now they blow a whistle each time the dolphin sticks it's nose
up and before they throw the fish.
After a while, the dolphin hears the whistle and makes
the connection with "nose up fish" when it hears the
sound. Then, the trainer begins to "shape" the behavior.
The fish and sound will only occur now when the
dolphin sticks it's nose way out of the water, a bit more, a bit more
(moving the goal posts, as it were) until finally, after many,
many weeks of careful watching, waiting, observing, whistle
blowing and fish throwing, the dolphin finally leaps clear out of the
water when the whistle sounds.
Dogs are not usually trained in this way, because we
can put them on the lead and push and shove them around to get them
to do what we want, but if you have the time and the inclination,
I would strongly urge you to have a go at this - it is a most
wonderful, intense and communicative way of mutual learning.
Clicker Dog Training
In the past few years, this way of training has been
resurrected and formalized under the name of Clicker Dog Training -
the dolphin's whistle has been replaced by a small
handheld click box to let the dog know when it's done something correctly
and to shape behaviors just like the dolphin trainers do. I
would recommend you to get a book on clicker training as
it's very interesting indeed and beyond the scope of this dog
training manual to go into it in detail. However, here's a short
outline of the basics.
Firstly, you give the dog a treat and click at the same time
until such time as the dog links the sound and the reward clearly
in their mind.
Then, and this is where this is so different from "ordinary dog
training", you sit and wait until your dog shows - by
accident - any kind of dog behavior training you would like to
reinforce and shape.
This could be anything from putting the head to one side, to
walking in a certain direction; with my poodle I chose the
theatrical stretch-and-yawn which looks as though
she's bowing to an audience.
As soon as the behavior occurs, you click and give the treat -
the click and behavior should be clearly linked in the
dogs mind, the treat may be thrown or just given a little later.
Eventually, and after much waiting with clicker in hand on your
part, and after much "trying everything under the sun to finally
get to hear that xxxx click" on your dog's part, the behavior
will occur more and more often, until the dog has a revelation
and the link between the behavior and the click has been
made.
Once that's happened, you can use the click to elicit the
behavior instead, or pair a word with the click-behavior chain.
The advantage of this training is that it allows you to teach all
kinds of things that might be virtually impossible to teach in
any other way (such as scratching on command, climbing
ladders, and long complex linked chains of behaviors).
It also really gets the dog to think actively about what it is
that you want. A lot of dogs like it because it's the first time
in their entire dealings with humanity that they have received
direct, unambiguous and precise feedback on their canine behavior, thus
reducing the "worry" about whether they're doing something right
or not.
Lastly, this exercise is so highly recommended in my view because
it really sharpens your observation skills and your reflexes; I
also like it because it is a truly co-operative effort. Give it a
try and believe me, you'll love it, even if at first your results
are a bit different from what you thought you were going to
achieve.
If you have concerns or simply need to ask a question,
I've set up a special E-mail account for this purpose.
Submit to mailto:dogproblems@dogskills.com
Thanks and have a great week.
Anthony Johnson, Lead Trainer
Dogskills Academy
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About Anthony Johnson SolvingDogroblems.Com &
Dogskills Academy are owned and operated by Anthony
Johnson. Anthony is a graduate of the University of
California at Berkeley, where he received his Bachelor
of Arts degree while also studying canine behavior
under prominent Israeli dog trainer Alon Geva.
Copyright 2004 by Tony Johnson
All Rights Reserved.
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