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Food in Training: Part I“Behavior goes where reinforcement flows.” Emily and Libby never leave the house without a treat pouch. Want to know why? They talk about the benefits of using food - AKA “Behavioral Dollars” - in the process of training your dog. They talk about the "why" of training with food, the concept of primary reinforcers.
Zazie Todd article: https://www.companionanimalpsychology.com/2017/04/the-ultimate-dog-training-tip.html |
Episode Transcript
Emily 0:09
Welcome to pod to the rescue.
Libby 0:11
Rescuing the dog is just the first step. We're here to help with everything that comes next. Hello, and welcome back to pod to the rescue.
I'm Libby. I'm a board member of Summit dog rescue in Boulder, Colorado.
Emily 0:26
And I'm Emily. I'm a certified professional dog trainer and a graduate of the Karen Pryor Academy. And I'm also a board member of Summit dog rescue.
Libby 0:35
And we are back today with another mini episode. This is going to be the first in a series of three or maybe more. Who knows. We could talk about this a lot. Yeah, about using food in training. We're doing a little series of training basics, short episodes, just some training tips for you to use when you're training your rescue dog. And today we wanted to talk about why we use food by professionals use food and training and why it's something that you might want to try on your own.
Emily 1:09
I think the why is so important for me, it's difficult to do something just because you know you're told to do it if I don't know why. So when we started rescuing dogs over a decade ago, we didn't use food, we didn't understand food, and we kind of poo pooed anyone who walked around with a tree pouch to be totally honest, we were like, why? Well, now we know why. And if you really think about it, you'll be like, Oh my God, it totally makes sense. When you go to a zoo or you watch any nature program and you see the trainers on the edge of the pool with the dolphins, they all have their buckets of fish. So in all the zoos the way they get the rhinos to move from one enclosure to the next or to participate in their veterinary care. They do all of that by shaping behavior with food because food is a primary reinforcer.
Libby 2:02
Yeah, so food is a primary reinforcer. It is something that is needed for survival. We don't need to learn that they're reinforcing. So example of primary reinforcers water, food, sleep, air sex. Secondary reinforcers then are things that we need to be taught or reinforcing. So for humans, money is a secondary reinforcer. We have to be taught the value of money.
Emily 2:35
Yeah, for dogs a secondary reinforcer would be like praise pets, if the dog likes that, or a tug toys. So we're not saying that you can't use other reinforcers at all. It's just food is really handy. And so many people say, Oh, my dog's not food motivated. But in the second part of this, we're going to discuss like how to work on that as well, because all food all animals eat. And dogs are scavengers, which is another reason that food really works well with them.
Libby 3:08
Yeah, food is just super motivating to dogs. And because it's so powerful as a primary reinforcer, we're just going to choose to focus on food for this series. So there's a saying in the behavior world, that reinforcement drives behavior.
Emily 3:23
So what that means is, I know we're using like this big word like reinforcement, but really what it means is rewarding a behavior, Jean Donaldson calls, you know, any reinforcer a behavioral paycheck, primarily food, I think, is what she was referring to. So like, think of every little bit of food that you're get your dog gets, as a behavioral paycheck. So, you know, what I find is that the way we deal with dogs is, you know, we put their food out in a bowl, and they eat it all. And then we're like, Stop jumping on aunt Marge. It's like, we just have the concept all wrong. So, you know, we don't want to be militant, like you cannot have a snack until you do these five behaviors. But we can reward behavior that we want to see show up. That's the definition of positive reinforcement.
Libby 4:13
Positive reinforcement means adding something immediately after a behavior occurs that makes a frequency of the behavior increase.
Emily 4:21
So that's kind of the secret to dog training is reinforcing behaviors that aren't really any training, reinforcing behaviors that we want to see increase in the future. So if your dog is sitting, go pop up a piece of food in his mouth. And we can talk about more of the mechanics later in future episodes, but anything you see that you want to see show up in your dog for the next 1015 years, reinforced that?
Libby 4:53
Yeah, and using food is just a really simple, easy way. I think to have a reinforcer ready, pretty handily. Just take a take a scoop of kibble from their morning meal, and they get a little less for breakfast, and then you have some, some food to reinforce with throughout the day, whenever you want to increase the frequency of certain behaviors.
Emily 5:18
Totally, I love the analogy, some trainer I didn't think this up, talked about like building a house. So you have your foundation, and that is reinforced with nails and you know, cross braces. So, you know, really your building behavior. And everything you reinforce, creates a stronger foundation, so that when you're out in the world, or ant March comes over, you have stronger behaviors that you have rewarded over and over in training The training world we talked about, like what's their reinforcement history? And really, what that means is like, how much have they been paid for behaviors, because behaviors that we pay for are going to be stronger behaviors. And it's, we always also say, like, don't let them rehearse things or practice things. So if they jump on aunt Marge 500 times, that's going to strengthen that behavior. So like, that's another episode is like, real world reinforcers that I can like, they'll learn something that we don't want them to learn. So food is just so handy.
Libby 6:20
Yeah. And on the other hand, if they sit and get a treat, every time aunt Marge walks through the door, then they're more likely to repeat that behavior, because that's the one they've been rehearsing and what they've been reinforced for,
Emily 6:33
exactly, it's to me, once you really understand it, you're like, Okay, this makes sense. They have to eat anyway, why don't we pay them for behaviors that we want rather than sit there and be like, Oh, my God, my dog is doing this or that, you know, I mean, there's so many things that dogs do naturally, that are natural dog behaviors, we brought them into our homes, and we expect them to have these really bizarre requirements like sit and you know, like, lay down in the corner, when someone comes out, like, we have a lot of things we ask dogs to do that are not really species specific behaviors.
Libby 7:08
That's why making it worth their while to do these things we want to ask of them, just it just helps everyone get along a little bit easier.
Emily 7:17
We have this mythology of like, they should just do what we say. But really, there's only two options in in learning, there's the carrot or the stick. So if you want to use you know, menacing fear based body language or punishment, then that would be the other reason they wouldn't jump on at March. But we'll get into why that just creates an unstable dog, which most people don't want. So we really push for the carrot.
Libby 7:47
Yeah. And to go back to that foundation analogy, when you reinforcement is just so much more powerful as a way to shape behavior just creates this, I guess, repertoire of behaviors that they're going to go to over and over again, because they've been reinforced.
Emily 8:10
I think it's so crucial to have them be successful in our human world. Right now, we're a little bit sad here at Summit dog rescue, because there's just so much information coming out about these people rehoming their dogs that they got during the pandemic. And we really wish that people knew just the basics. Because bringing a dog into your home is really difficult. And this is this is kind of like knowing how to put gas in your car. Like when my son learned to drive, I was like you put gas in this is how you do it, you need money to put the gas in, and you need to have like, check your air pressure. Like I feel like food, you know, and how to use it and how to reinforce behaviors is just something so basic that every dog owner should understand it. And then in future episodes, we'll talk about why punishment is not a great strategy now that we know better.
Libby 9:05
Definitely. So let's briefly address something that Emily, both you and I have said to ourselves in the past something that is still really prevalent in dog training discussions online, which is that while my dog should just listen to me, he just knows he should just listen when I tell him to sit. And we like to. We like to think that our dogs just have this undying love and respect for us. And you know, there are some dogs who do there are dogs and people who build that relationship over many, many, many years.
Emily 9:45
But dogs do what works. Yeah, just like us, you know. And there's that whole spectrum of dogs like maybe you have your super easygoing golden retriever, who didn't come from a hard background. I had proper puppy socialization. And he'll set for good boy. I mean, I felt like I've had those dogs, I actually had a border collie sadly never used a treat ever, because I didn't believe in it back then. That's like not believing that the Earth is round, but I just, I wasn't educated. And it's really goes back to that when you know better you do better. One thing I think Jean Donaldson was like that whole dogs aim to please is really another one of those folklore stories that people say over and over, like he likes to please, you know, he's working for some sort of motivation, and maybe your dog's motivation is, you know, to get a scratch on the head. But I think that's the unicorn dog, you know, I think we really want to reach the majority of dogs that actually do have issues that are not compatible with our lives. I mean, issues is even a strong word, because it's like, really just natural dog behavior, like smelling crutches. Totally normal dog behavior. But you know, we don't really love it. So it's like, teach the dog what we want, instead of being like now. Right?
Libby 11:15
Yeah, dogs do what works to access reinforcement and avoid punishment. And you know, what an easy reinforcer is food. It's handy. It's right there. So why not use it?
Emily 11:28
And that goes to that whole concept of the scavenger to, you know, nobody really thinks about like, oh, I have a scavenger in my house, you know, because scavenger has kind of a bad rap. But that is what dogs really are more than they are like this wolf, like running out nature in a pack that is all been debunked by actual science. And, you know, it's not a great PR gig. But really, they're scavengers, and they came to most likely, like the way they evolved with humans was by like, eating out of the garbage dumps, and piles at the edge of encampments of like primitive humans. And, you know, then they got closer and closer to us. But really, they they got close to us because of food. Probably not so much the Attaboy. Yeah, that evolved later.
Libby 12:18
So yeah, basically, dogs are just at all times trying to figure out how to get some tasty morsels. We can use that to our advantage, so why not?
Emily 12:32
And that's last thing and then I think we should wrap it up before people are like, we get it. We got it. I'll cut up the hot dog. The last thing is they've done studies on free roaming dogs, which like I think it's like 80% of all dogs in the on the planet are free roaming dogs. And, and totally someone's gonna listen to this and be like you got your statistics wrong. But it's the majority of dogs are just free roaming dogs. And then they studied, like, how much time of their waking day or waking hours did they spend looking for food? Like what did they do during their waking hours. And it was something like 80% of their waking hours. They were scavenging for food morsels. So then we feed them out of a bowl in the morning, and we feed them out of the bowl at night. And we're like, why are you chewing the couch? Why? It's like because we took away their whole purpose in life. All right, well, I think probably that wraps it up for a mini episode. We could talk about this for about 500 hours.
Libby 13:38
All right, so we will just end here and leave you with a quote from a recent article by Zazie Todd, the one thing every dog owner should know. So she writes. The one thing every dog owner should know about dog training is this use food. It sounds very simple, doesn't it? And it's not exactly a secret. Modern dog training uses food. Use food to reward your dog for doing things you like such as sit or wait or drop it when you ask. I'm not saying food is the only reward you would use with your dog. There might be times when you use a game of fetch, tug on a rope lots of lovely petting or even life rewards like the opportunity to go chase a critter. But for most dog training situations, food is the easiest way to deliver positive reinforcement because it is so quick and efficient. And scientists have found that food is a better word than getting pet for praise. The reason I wish more people would know to use food is that would make it easier for people to find a good dog trainer and to weed out bad dog training advice.
Thanks for tuning in. If you liked this episode, don't forget to rate and review. It helps other folks like you find the show. To find out more about our programming and adoptable rescue dogs you can visit Sumit dog rescue.org thanks to Mike pesci for the original music and to Alex Lee Ammons and for the love media for graphics production and editing. See you soon on pod to the rescue
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Welcome to pod to the rescue.
Libby 0:11
Rescuing the dog is just the first step. We're here to help with everything that comes next. Hello, and welcome back to pod to the rescue.
I'm Libby. I'm a board member of Summit dog rescue in Boulder, Colorado.
Emily 0:26
And I'm Emily. I'm a certified professional dog trainer and a graduate of the Karen Pryor Academy. And I'm also a board member of Summit dog rescue.
Libby 0:35
And we are back today with another mini episode. This is going to be the first in a series of three or maybe more. Who knows. We could talk about this a lot. Yeah, about using food in training. We're doing a little series of training basics, short episodes, just some training tips for you to use when you're training your rescue dog. And today we wanted to talk about why we use food by professionals use food and training and why it's something that you might want to try on your own.
Emily 1:09
I think the why is so important for me, it's difficult to do something just because you know you're told to do it if I don't know why. So when we started rescuing dogs over a decade ago, we didn't use food, we didn't understand food, and we kind of poo pooed anyone who walked around with a tree pouch to be totally honest, we were like, why? Well, now we know why. And if you really think about it, you'll be like, Oh my God, it totally makes sense. When you go to a zoo or you watch any nature program and you see the trainers on the edge of the pool with the dolphins, they all have their buckets of fish. So in all the zoos the way they get the rhinos to move from one enclosure to the next or to participate in their veterinary care. They do all of that by shaping behavior with food because food is a primary reinforcer.
Libby 2:02
Yeah, so food is a primary reinforcer. It is something that is needed for survival. We don't need to learn that they're reinforcing. So example of primary reinforcers water, food, sleep, air sex. Secondary reinforcers then are things that we need to be taught or reinforcing. So for humans, money is a secondary reinforcer. We have to be taught the value of money.
Emily 2:35
Yeah, for dogs a secondary reinforcer would be like praise pets, if the dog likes that, or a tug toys. So we're not saying that you can't use other reinforcers at all. It's just food is really handy. And so many people say, Oh, my dog's not food motivated. But in the second part of this, we're going to discuss like how to work on that as well, because all food all animals eat. And dogs are scavengers, which is another reason that food really works well with them.
Libby 3:08
Yeah, food is just super motivating to dogs. And because it's so powerful as a primary reinforcer, we're just going to choose to focus on food for this series. So there's a saying in the behavior world, that reinforcement drives behavior.
Emily 3:23
So what that means is, I know we're using like this big word like reinforcement, but really what it means is rewarding a behavior, Jean Donaldson calls, you know, any reinforcer a behavioral paycheck, primarily food, I think, is what she was referring to. So like, think of every little bit of food that you're get your dog gets, as a behavioral paycheck. So, you know, what I find is that the way we deal with dogs is, you know, we put their food out in a bowl, and they eat it all. And then we're like, Stop jumping on aunt Marge. It's like, we just have the concept all wrong. So, you know, we don't want to be militant, like you cannot have a snack until you do these five behaviors. But we can reward behavior that we want to see show up. That's the definition of positive reinforcement.
Libby 4:13
Positive reinforcement means adding something immediately after a behavior occurs that makes a frequency of the behavior increase.
Emily 4:21
So that's kind of the secret to dog training is reinforcing behaviors that aren't really any training, reinforcing behaviors that we want to see increase in the future. So if your dog is sitting, go pop up a piece of food in his mouth. And we can talk about more of the mechanics later in future episodes, but anything you see that you want to see show up in your dog for the next 1015 years, reinforced that?
Libby 4:53
Yeah, and using food is just a really simple, easy way. I think to have a reinforcer ready, pretty handily. Just take a take a scoop of kibble from their morning meal, and they get a little less for breakfast, and then you have some, some food to reinforce with throughout the day, whenever you want to increase the frequency of certain behaviors.
Emily 5:18
Totally, I love the analogy, some trainer I didn't think this up, talked about like building a house. So you have your foundation, and that is reinforced with nails and you know, cross braces. So, you know, really your building behavior. And everything you reinforce, creates a stronger foundation, so that when you're out in the world, or ant March comes over, you have stronger behaviors that you have rewarded over and over in training The training world we talked about, like what's their reinforcement history? And really, what that means is like, how much have they been paid for behaviors, because behaviors that we pay for are going to be stronger behaviors. And it's, we always also say, like, don't let them rehearse things or practice things. So if they jump on aunt Marge 500 times, that's going to strengthen that behavior. So like, that's another episode is like, real world reinforcers that I can like, they'll learn something that we don't want them to learn. So food is just so handy.
Libby 6:20
Yeah. And on the other hand, if they sit and get a treat, every time aunt Marge walks through the door, then they're more likely to repeat that behavior, because that's the one they've been rehearsing and what they've been reinforced for,
Emily 6:33
exactly, it's to me, once you really understand it, you're like, Okay, this makes sense. They have to eat anyway, why don't we pay them for behaviors that we want rather than sit there and be like, Oh, my God, my dog is doing this or that, you know, I mean, there's so many things that dogs do naturally, that are natural dog behaviors, we brought them into our homes, and we expect them to have these really bizarre requirements like sit and you know, like, lay down in the corner, when someone comes out, like, we have a lot of things we ask dogs to do that are not really species specific behaviors.
Libby 7:08
That's why making it worth their while to do these things we want to ask of them, just it just helps everyone get along a little bit easier.
Emily 7:17
We have this mythology of like, they should just do what we say. But really, there's only two options in in learning, there's the carrot or the stick. So if you want to use you know, menacing fear based body language or punishment, then that would be the other reason they wouldn't jump on at March. But we'll get into why that just creates an unstable dog, which most people don't want. So we really push for the carrot.
Libby 7:47
Yeah. And to go back to that foundation analogy, when you reinforcement is just so much more powerful as a way to shape behavior just creates this, I guess, repertoire of behaviors that they're going to go to over and over again, because they've been reinforced.
Emily 8:10
I think it's so crucial to have them be successful in our human world. Right now, we're a little bit sad here at Summit dog rescue, because there's just so much information coming out about these people rehoming their dogs that they got during the pandemic. And we really wish that people knew just the basics. Because bringing a dog into your home is really difficult. And this is this is kind of like knowing how to put gas in your car. Like when my son learned to drive, I was like you put gas in this is how you do it, you need money to put the gas in, and you need to have like, check your air pressure. Like I feel like food, you know, and how to use it and how to reinforce behaviors is just something so basic that every dog owner should understand it. And then in future episodes, we'll talk about why punishment is not a great strategy now that we know better.
Libby 9:05
Definitely. So let's briefly address something that Emily, both you and I have said to ourselves in the past something that is still really prevalent in dog training discussions online, which is that while my dog should just listen to me, he just knows he should just listen when I tell him to sit. And we like to. We like to think that our dogs just have this undying love and respect for us. And you know, there are some dogs who do there are dogs and people who build that relationship over many, many, many years.
Emily 9:45
But dogs do what works. Yeah, just like us, you know. And there's that whole spectrum of dogs like maybe you have your super easygoing golden retriever, who didn't come from a hard background. I had proper puppy socialization. And he'll set for good boy. I mean, I felt like I've had those dogs, I actually had a border collie sadly never used a treat ever, because I didn't believe in it back then. That's like not believing that the Earth is round, but I just, I wasn't educated. And it's really goes back to that when you know better you do better. One thing I think Jean Donaldson was like that whole dogs aim to please is really another one of those folklore stories that people say over and over, like he likes to please, you know, he's working for some sort of motivation, and maybe your dog's motivation is, you know, to get a scratch on the head. But I think that's the unicorn dog, you know, I think we really want to reach the majority of dogs that actually do have issues that are not compatible with our lives. I mean, issues is even a strong word, because it's like, really just natural dog behavior, like smelling crutches. Totally normal dog behavior. But you know, we don't really love it. So it's like, teach the dog what we want, instead of being like now. Right?
Libby 11:15
Yeah, dogs do what works to access reinforcement and avoid punishment. And you know, what an easy reinforcer is food. It's handy. It's right there. So why not use it?
Emily 11:28
And that goes to that whole concept of the scavenger to, you know, nobody really thinks about like, oh, I have a scavenger in my house, you know, because scavenger has kind of a bad rap. But that is what dogs really are more than they are like this wolf, like running out nature in a pack that is all been debunked by actual science. And, you know, it's not a great PR gig. But really, they're scavengers, and they came to most likely, like the way they evolved with humans was by like, eating out of the garbage dumps, and piles at the edge of encampments of like primitive humans. And, you know, then they got closer and closer to us. But really, they they got close to us because of food. Probably not so much the Attaboy. Yeah, that evolved later.
Libby 12:18
So yeah, basically, dogs are just at all times trying to figure out how to get some tasty morsels. We can use that to our advantage, so why not?
Emily 12:32
And that's last thing and then I think we should wrap it up before people are like, we get it. We got it. I'll cut up the hot dog. The last thing is they've done studies on free roaming dogs, which like I think it's like 80% of all dogs in the on the planet are free roaming dogs. And, and totally someone's gonna listen to this and be like you got your statistics wrong. But it's the majority of dogs are just free roaming dogs. And then they studied, like, how much time of their waking day or waking hours did they spend looking for food? Like what did they do during their waking hours. And it was something like 80% of their waking hours. They were scavenging for food morsels. So then we feed them out of a bowl in the morning, and we feed them out of the bowl at night. And we're like, why are you chewing the couch? Why? It's like because we took away their whole purpose in life. All right, well, I think probably that wraps it up for a mini episode. We could talk about this for about 500 hours.
Libby 13:38
All right, so we will just end here and leave you with a quote from a recent article by Zazie Todd, the one thing every dog owner should know. So she writes. The one thing every dog owner should know about dog training is this use food. It sounds very simple, doesn't it? And it's not exactly a secret. Modern dog training uses food. Use food to reward your dog for doing things you like such as sit or wait or drop it when you ask. I'm not saying food is the only reward you would use with your dog. There might be times when you use a game of fetch, tug on a rope lots of lovely petting or even life rewards like the opportunity to go chase a critter. But for most dog training situations, food is the easiest way to deliver positive reinforcement because it is so quick and efficient. And scientists have found that food is a better word than getting pet for praise. The reason I wish more people would know to use food is that would make it easier for people to find a good dog trainer and to weed out bad dog training advice.
Thanks for tuning in. If you liked this episode, don't forget to rate and review. It helps other folks like you find the show. To find out more about our programming and adoptable rescue dogs you can visit Sumit dog rescue.org thanks to Mike pesci for the original music and to Alex Lee Ammons and for the love media for graphics production and editing. See you soon on pod to the rescue
Transcribed by https://otter.ai