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WHEN TO ADD A CUE
Knowing when to add a cue for a behavior you’ve begun teaching can be a challenge, right? If we add it too soon, the dog might not yet know what behavior he should be offering, or the cue may get tied to an unpolished behavior.
Once we do begin using a cue, we now need to teach the dog she must wait for it before offering the behavior.
In the video, the target behavior is jumping over a raised pole in one particular direction. Hahnia had already been introduced to this behavior and was doing it easily. This video shows when I begin to fold in the new cue “OVER,” saying it just before she’s planning on jumping anyway.
▶During the first 30 sec of video, what do you notice about the way most treats are delivered, and why do you think this might be helpful?
At the :30 sec mark (which is a bit later in the training session), Hahnia is now beginning to learn to wait to hear the cue “OVER”????before going over the jump. When she looks at me (as if waiting for instruction!), it’s an ideal time to ‘reward’ her by giving the cue. The cue is her green light to do the jump, which leads to a treat.
At the :37 sec mark, Hahnia begins to experiment with other behaviors to see what else might work. She takes the jump in reverse, and she does a bit of a ‘toro’ trick (scraping back paws). Neither score her treats. But when she waits in front of the jump, I give her the cue, she jumps, and then receives a treat.
At :49, she experiments some more – offering a leg lift, a jump, and a return jump, before finally focusing on me and waiting. ???? I immediately give the cue, she jumps, and receives a treat.
Hahnia had a lot of training experience under her belt by this point, so I see her experimenting with behaviors as her way of gathering information, i.e. what works, what doesn’t.
▶But do you see potential problems with this, say if a dog is newer to training, or particularly sensitive? How can we minimize any stress for the dog during the training process?
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5 Replies
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Great video!
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Watching her was like watching a big dog perform this behavior! She is adorable!
You are delivering the treats on the other side for her to target that side, making her choice somewhat easy to go over the bar, for the payout.
To potentially minimize stress, I may start with the dog closer to the set up, train for shorter time and reps (with success). Depending on where they are in the training, I still may pay for looking at the setup or moving in that direction; to keep them engaged.
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Great input, @jenz !
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Such a nice session! Your techniques are vital to stimulus control which is that the dog only offers the behavior when cued, and only that behavior shows up with that cue happens…. Discriminating which cue matches which behavior and when to offer a trained behavior is a step some folks forget to add in.
Stimulus control is important for the psychological health of the dog. Stimulus control helps a dog predict what behaviors will pay and when to perform them. Without it, you have a whirling tornado of behaviors getting tossed out at random. I have worked with animals like that. It’s unsettling for everyone.
Nice job, @virginiad – and thanks so much for sharing this clip and your insights!
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Yes, @catherine , there are a lot of whirling tornadoes out there. ????
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