In an earlier post I dared to ask "Who invented animal training?" and went on to detail the work of Keller and Marian Breland who not only discovered "shaping" and bridging stimulus, but also invented clicker training.
Keller and Marian Breland trained animal acts featured in movies, circuses, museums, fairs, zoos and amusement parks across the nation, and also trained many of the trainers that worked in these facilities as well.
By 1951, the Brelands had trained thousands of animals from dozens of species, and in an article for American Psychologist, they said they thought rewards-based clicker training might work on any animal to train just about anything.
And then something happened.
They noticed that clicker training was, in certain circumstances, beginning to fail in ways that they could no longer overlook.
In a 1961 paper entitled, The Misbehavior of Organisms, Keller and Marian Breland described their first experience with the failure of reward-based operant conditioning.
It seems that when working with pigs, chickens and raccoons, the animals would often learn a trick, but then begin to drift away from the learned behavior and towards more instinctive, unreinforced, foraging actions.
What was going on?
Put simply, instinct was raising its inconvenient head.
Though Skinner and his disciples had always maintained that performance was driven by external rewards or punishments, here was clear evidence that there was an internal code that could not always be ignored.
The Brelands wrote:
These egregious failures came as a rather considerable shock to us, for there was nothing in our background in behaviorism to prepare us for such gross inabilities to predict and control the behavior of animals with which we had been working for years.... [T]he diagnosis of theory failure does not depend on subtle statistical interpretations or on semantic legerdemain - the animal simply does not do what he has been conditioned to do.
The Brelands did not overstate the problem, nor did they quantify it. They simply stated a fact: instinct existed, and sometimes it bubbled up and over-rode trained behaviors.
Clearly, every species had different instincts, and just as clearly, a great deal of animal training could be done without ever triggering overpowering instinct. Still, the Brelands noted,
After 14 years of continuous conditioning and observation of thousands of animals, it is our reluctant conclusion that the behavior of any species cannot be adequately understood, predicted, or controlled without knowledge of its instinctive patterns, evolutionary history, and ecological niche.
What does this have to do with dogs?
Quite a lot.
You see a small but vocal group of clicker trainers believe everything a dog does is learned by external rewards, and internal drives are nothing but "old school" fiction.
While the Brelands argued that a species could not be adequately controlled without “knowledge of its instinctive patterns, evolutionary history, and ecological niche," the most extreme militants in the world of clicker training now seek to minimize and disavow the very nature and history of dogs.
Dog packs? There are no such things, we are told.
Dominance? It does not exist in feral dogs or in wolves, and never mind the experts who disagree.
Prey drive? Not too much said about that!
Of course, instinctive behaviors and drives do not disappear simply because they are inconvenient.
As Keller and Marian Breland put it,
[A]lthough it was easy to banish the Instinctivists from the science during the Behavioristic Revolution, it was not possible to banish instinct so easily.
Of course, one must be careful to qualify the role of instinct.
Yes, dogs have instincts, but the history of dog breeding has largely been about reducing instinctive drives. As a consequence, most breeds have instinctive drives that are sufficiently attenuated that they are not much of an impediment to basic rewards-based training.
That said, not all dog breeds are alike. Not every dog is a blank slate, as the owner of any herding dog or game-bred terrier will tell you. Prey drive does not disappear because you want it to. Many problematic behaviors in dogs -- especially behaviors in hard-wired working dogs that are being raised as pets -- are self-reinforcing behaviors that express themselves without any external reinforcement at all.
Clicker training, the Brelands remind us, cannot solve everything.
Is rewards-based training the most important tool in any trainer’s box of tricks and methods?
Absolutely. There is not much debate there.
But the Brelands remind us that dogs do not come to the trainer as a tabula rasa, nor should we think of all dog breeds as being more or less the same, or that all responses are equally conditionable to all stimuli.
Dogs and other animals, it turns out, are a bit more complicated that white rats, and the real world is not a laboratory.
In the wild and on the farm, animals have managed to learn, all by themselves, since the Dawn of Time and long before clickers came on the scene.
How did they do that? Does the real world have as much to teach us as the lab? Keller and Marian Breland thought it did.
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I disagree that dog breeding and selection reduces instinctive or inherent drives, except perhaps for those few dogs selected solely to be kennel-kept show dogs or experimental subjects.
ReplyDeleteI prefer to think of it as tinkering with the balance of those drives. In the case of pet selection, the social drives are emphasized.
A sensible coyote does not go after badger in his own den. That would be nuts, eh? But a JRT is balanced differently. It would be more difficult to condition him to NOT be monomaniacally predatory than it would be to do the same with a coyote.
By the same token, training a golden retriever bred to be a guide dog to perform a schutzhund routine would be exceedingly difficult; persuading her to work as an actual patrol dog, probably impossible.
Upland pointing dogs have many traits that should make them superb airscenting SAR dogs. But this is rarely done, and least often with the big-running pointers and setters whose noses and ground-covering powers make SAR handers drool. It's too difficult to de-bird their brains.
I could go on.
Note that I don't really distinguish between "clicker training" and any other approach to training in opposition to strong instincts. Method is unimportant when you are working against those inborn traits.
A good trainer tries to find a way to steer the instinct that is there in the direction of the work that is needed.
A wise one doesn't set herself and the dog up for frustration by trying to "prove" that the instincts don't matter, and training will trump all.
Most dogs are not bred to do anything except not be to much trouble for their owners.
ReplyDeleteThis is by design.
The retrievers are the most popular dogs in the U.S. not because people are hunting with them (98% never see a gun), but because the dogs are so phlegmatic. A retriever's skill is that not that it retrieves -- but that it is very biddable and does not have too many strong internal drives. A retriever is not a pit bull, a terrier, a collies, a corgi, a shelie, or even a working pointer or setter. A retriever might like to go for a walk, but it's OK to just sleep too. Whatever you want. All and all, a very easy-going dog for the most part, with very little explosive drive of any kind. There are exceptions, of course, but the type is clear and the stereotype exists because it is true.
On the other end of the scale, is the "raw dog" -- the wolf. here is an animal that is so problematic with strong internal drives and instincts, that they are illegal to own without a special license in most states.
For a 1936 article on the push to "denature" dogs, see >> http://terriermandotcom.blogspot.com/2007/12/science-remakes-dog.html
The denaturing of dogs is one reason some people prefer show dogs to their working side. A working dog has a code exploding in it all the time. Not so much the show dogs of the same type.
Of course in working dogs, some codes are valued more than others and are even amplified, but on the nonworking side (most dogs) those codes are not valued, and they are generally bred away from by design or due to genetic drift.
And what is the firs things owners are told if their dogs are a handful? Spay and neuter. Desexing a dog is a way of removing instinct and drive.
P.
"Monomaniacally" has got to be the coolest word I've heard in a long time.
ReplyDeleteSeahorse
Heather's right. Working dog breeds have been selected for (modified) instincts as thoroughly as their show cousins have been selected for modified morphologies and ability to "glow" at dog shows.
ReplyDeleteMy experience is almost entirely with one breed; Border Collies, and I believe Border Collies want not merely to work (all working breeds have that desire) but also to be trained. Unlike breeds selected for reckless courage, pursuit or birdyness, they were selected for their eagerness to work with human beings. Ironically,that makes them very difficult pets.
Donald McCaig
Heather and Don, I think if you read this piece a bit closer you will see herding dogs and terriers are specially mentioned in the paragraph under the one Heather cited.
ReplyDeleteIf I may ....
_ _ _ _
"That said, not all dog breeds are alike. Not every dog is a blank slate, as the owner of any herding dog or game-bred terrier will tell you. Prey drive does not disappear because you want it to. Many problematic behaviors in dogs -- especially behaviors in hard-wired working dogs that are being raised as pets -- are self-reinforcing behaviors that express themselves without any external reinforcement at all."
_ _ _ _
But let's be honest -- most dogs are NOT being worked and are NOT being bred to do a job and never have been in the last 100 years.
That is even true for most herding breeds and most terriers too, I might add. There's a reason border collies are found on the hill and damn few others, and Jack Russell and Patterdales are found in holes, and damn few others.
There's not much overpowering instinct in pugs, papillons, golden retrievers, poodles, yorkies, laborador retrievers, cocker spaniels, west highland terriers, beagles, german shepherds, mini schnauzers, english bulldogs, etc. Ditto with most mutts and cross breeds.
The idea that most dogs these days are bred for a function is a lie, and so too is the notion that many of these breeds were EVER bred for function. What is the function of pug, a maltese, a yorkie, a mini schnauzer, a cavalier kind charles spaniel, a boston terrier, or even a german shepherd dog? Dog breeds are mostly entertainment, status symbol and conspicuos consumption consumer products and always have been. Strong drives are NOT wanted, and when found are often a problem for their owners.
Go through a breed list and find me ANY breed of dog that mostly works or even works 5% of its progeny. Not there.
There's a reason we tell most people no to get border collies or working terriers -- we want to keep them at work and keep them out of the kill shelters! But most dogs do not work and cannot work and never worked except in someone's dreams, and so most dogs do OK as pets because they do not have very strong overpowering instincts.
There are a lot of reasons not to get a pug or a boston terrier or a chihuahua or a GSD, but strong instincts and drives are NOT among them. Some herding breeds and terriers are "the exception which proves the rule" as I note.
Patrick
Of work bred dogs maybe only the Alaskan Husky passes the more-dogs-working-than-are pets test. 20 years ago, or so, the ABCA (Border Collie reg) surveyed its owners. As I recall, a substantial majority lived on farms, mostly cattle operations. From what I know about farmers, I'd bet less than half those dogs actually worked stock. Today, what with agility & all, I'd venture that maybe one in ten North American Border Collies actually works stock.
ReplyDeleteDuring the dog genome experiment, i learned that the genes that comprise "working' Border Collie behaviors are distinct and not adjacent on the genome (they're not inherited in bundles). Or, as Tommy Wilson said of farmyard mismatings "They have some of the bits but not all of them." This suggests several questions: How did illiterate shepherds select for the complex of traits? and which traits are most likely lost when bred for the showring.
I'm pretty sure that "keenness" is the first to go. Undesirable in a pet, it's the motor of the working dog.
Also - all working genetics are not equally succeptible to show breeding ruin. The Westminster KC's logo "Don" aka "Sensation" was a trial dog back in the 1880's, as well as a bench winner. Despite repeated show breedings (and some show overtones in the field trial bird dog community), AKC Setters and Pointers were still seen in real (field) bird dog trials until the mid sixties.
I wish "keenness" was the first to go. Maybe in border collies. I guess the dull affect of the show collie is an example of that. But notsomuch in other popular pet breeds -- retrievers, other hunting dogs, terriers.
ReplyDeleteInstead, we get descendants of work-bred dogs of many stripes that retain the hyper without the more interesting refinements that allow it to be directed to a useful end.
IME, one of the first things lost in pet or show breeding across breeds is general intelligence, problem-solving.
But sociability gets enhanced and exaggerated by pet breeding.
Probably overall a good thing, but the cause of one of the top two behavior problems that trainers do not want to see -- true separation anxiety. It's a house-wrecker and a dog-killer.
A funny story: I am often asked by farmers why my dogs look so calm, but the Russells they have seen all look so hyper.
ReplyDeleteI have been asked this often enough that I have a shtick that I do. First, I get very close, invading their personal space a little bit, like an Arab might if he were talking to a European. This is a kind of "pressure" and I do it to punctuate the next sentence: "Imagine you were gay," I say, "but you did not know it.
Of course the farmer recoils a bit in horror, but now he is listeninbg very closely.
"Your whole life you had these anxieties, and you had no idea why. Then you discovered you were gay. Oh! So THAT's what that's about! And then you were calm. You knew what to do with that drive. You knew who you were and what it was about and that there was a place for that. You became self-actualized. You become clam. That's what happpens with working dogs are in the suburbs -- they have all these urges and drives and they do no know what do with them. They have no release, and so the code explodes in inconvenient ways."
And, of course, the famers who have stock always get it. They know there is a code in some animals, and that the code is a bit diffent, one from another.
But I think most breeds do not have much code left because so many breeds were never bred for anything. The bigger a pain in the ass a breed is, however, the more likely it is tyo have a code that is talking. I respectuflly disagree with Heather on retrievers; there is not much specialized code there. Almost any dog can be taught to retrieve almost anything. An Airedale or a GSD can do the job of a retriever without batting an eye.
P.
"The job" of a working bred retriever isn't to retrieve.
ReplyDeleteThat's "the reward".
"The job" is to go out there in difficult conditions and stay out there until they git 'er done.
It's a whole lot easier to count on a dog to do that if every fiber of his being is telling him to get those feathers in his mouth.
And yes, retrievers with that kind of drive and energy are a huge PITA for the average pet home with both parents working and three kids in soccer practice to live with.
Stoicism is neither drive nor instinct, nor does it make a dog hard to train.
ReplyDeleteNor, might I add, do retrivers have very much of it.
If they did, they would be used for activities or croses that required stoicism and a need to never give up. But they aren't.
In fact, in the world of working dogs, I can think of fewer dogs with LESS stick. Fox hounds have stick, and so do terriers and pits, and a lot of collies. GSDs and Dobies and Rotts and Airedales and huskies have stick. But retrievers? Not so much.
What the retriever brings to the table is a generally good-natured biddability, a decent size, and (hopefully) a decent coat. Not much more. Those three qualities, however, are enough to make retievers the #1 dogs in the western world.
P
If you understood me to say retrievers are stoic or that I believe stoicism is drive, I didn't make myself clear.
ReplyDeleteI also don't believe they're particularly stoic. If they were, I'm not sure it'd be helpful.
What they have is a willingness to persevere in the face of adversity, which is not the same as stoicism and is fueled by their keen desire to make the retrieve.
I've found biddability is a great strength, but it only gets you so far. When the going gets tough you need that dog to need to retrieve. That's what gives them the willingness to deal with the briars and the icy water and the other discomforts they encounter in their work when it'd be so much easier and more comfortable to just head back to the truck.
There are plenty of dogs out there bearing the name "retriever" who would do just that.
If you've attempted to train field work with really keen retrievers, and you've attempted it with those who are not so keen, you'll appreciate the difference. You will find the highest percentage of really keen dogs come from working lines. I don't think it's coincidence.
I wrote, not too long ago, in a comment that didn't get past moderation, about some work that I'd done with a bitch on some blinds. This particular bitch is field trial bred.
She doesn't have a stoic bone in her body. Her tolerance for pressure, generally, is so little as to practically not exist. She is very, very sensitive, mentally and physically.
She is a retrieving maniac. She not only WILL retrieve until she drops, she will actively try to talk you into letting her.
If it weren't for that quality, she'd never have accomplished anything. It's the only thing strong enough to overcome her difficulty in holding up under pressure. There is no external motivation strong enough to do that for her.
If her eagerness to retrieve (as opposed to willingness) isn't drive and it isn't instinct, I don't know what else it could be.
I'm lost then; what does your point have to do with the topic of this post, which is dog training and the obstacles thereof?
ReplyDeleteP
My point has less to do with the topic of the post, and more to do with the discussion in the comments.
ReplyDeleteMy experience with retrievers has led me to believe there is a bit more to them than was being described.
Re: calmness. Patrick's analogy makes sense to me. While Border Collies are very often a PITA as pets, retired sheepdogs make wonderful pets. One of the sentences I expect from first time sheepdog trainers is "He's so excited coming here. And he's been so much better at him!"
ReplyDeleteDonald McCaig
One has never lived with a Flat-Coated Retriever!! Talk about manical drive!
ReplyDeleteManiacal drive?
ReplyDeleteCompared to what, a cat?
Of course, all young dogs can be highly energetic and destructive if untrained, but the Flat-coat is not noted for being maniacal.
In fact it is described (as all retrievers are in so many words) as being: "..devoted, and friendly, an ideal companion with a strong bond to its owner and family" (wikipedia) or "...a responsive, loving member of the family, a versatile working dog, multi-talented, sensible, bright and tractable. In competition the Flat-Coat demonstrates stability- and a desire to please with a confident, happy and outgoing attitude characterized by a wagging tail." (Flat-Coated Retriever Society).
Again, there is not much drive in a Flat-coat that makes it difficult to train; quite the opposite. Does a young dog have a log attention span? No, but that's true for all breeds. Two 15 minute trainings a day for a month, and any properly trained retriever will be a genius.
What Flat-coat DOES have going for it is a lighter body weight than the ponderous dogs frequenly seen in other retriever breeds.
Patrick
I'd like to throw something into the mix from a different perspective. I've been reading Daniel H. Pink's recently released book Drive: The Surprising Truth about What Motivates Us. One of his early chapters is about how a number of human studies have demonstrated the "counterintuitive consequences of extrinsic incentives" or what Mr. Pink refers to as "the hidden cost of rewards." In this chapter, Mr. Pink discusses a number of studies which have lead to the conclusion that "tangible rewards tend to have a substantially negative effect on intrinsic motivation." The point Mr. Pink makes is that in our schools and workplace, we tend to try to motivate people by extrinsic incentives, like more money, titles, other tangible benefits. But the studies indicate that once basic level needs are met, these external rewards do not promote internal motivation, and can actually diminish such motivation. (Please read the book for its careful analysis that I have no room to repeat here). Since reading this chapter, I have been trying to draw analogies to my dog training experience, which is based on the principles of operant conditioning. In other words, reward based training. I really didn't know what to make of it, but was led to the original blog posting by a friend's Facebook link. Now Mr. Pink's premise seems as though it could apply to all species. I might suggest that perhaps the thread of the previous postings about the strength and power of a dog or a particular breed's "instincts" is really our human way of trying to describe a dog's internal motivation. Clearly, we are not all that good at understanding what actually motivates ourselves and other human beings, so it does not surprise me that we would have difficulty grasping what really motivates our dogs. As a result, we then fall into the most obvious (not to say that it is not accurate) rationale of attributing internal canine motivation to breed-specific instincts.
ReplyDeleteJean Emery
(Border Collie owner)
Phoenix, AZ
Most trainers spend a huge amount of time learning each breed's inherent behavior. A good trainer will use that behavior and work with it rather than against it.
ReplyDeleteUsing a clicker is perhaps a quicker way to teach dogs. Certainly research tells us so.
I don't quite know why you are so against a little device that makes a pop sound!
BTW, I don't use clickers but can respect those who do.
Tc27 -- I see you are a novice dog trainer. Good. Excellent.
ReplyDeleteYou might want to slow down a bit, however, and then you will be a little less likely to talk out of your hat.
You see, it's nonsense that I an opposed to clicker training. I use it, salute it, etc. If you had read this blog, you would know that. Heck, I even give a salute to the Click Song!
It's nonsense too that "Most trainers spend a huge amount of time learning each breed's inherent behavior." This is laughable. Do you know how many breeds there are? Do you know how little experience most dog trainers really have before they hang out their shingle? This is a self-certifying industry where a one-day course lets you put letters behind your name.
For the record, this post was seen by Bob Bailey before it was even put up. The words are my own, but I do not shoot out my hat too often, and I checked with Bob before I characterized (or mis-characterized) Keller or Marianne's work. He helped me get it right (or closer to right than it was). This is history son, not opinion.
Also, this blog has a seach engine. It has tag words. Investigate. And perhaps think a little less about breeds, eh? Each dog is different and while breed types are rough guides and are a place to start, there is a LOT of variation with breeds.
Also, spend some time learning the difference between training and untraining, rewards and consequences, and the problems asociated with "unrewarding" self-reinforcing stimulus. I am not yet sure you even understand this post if you think it is some bash on clicker training. This is part of a historical tale about the people who INVENTED clicker training. They are my heroes, as I have said in the past.
P.