When I work in the zoo community I often film training
sessions to record our progress and what we may need to work on with a
particular behavior goal. Sometimes that means I might even get a glimpse of
myself doing a little training demonstration to get things started. In a recent
session I watched myself working with a brown bear on a lie down behavior.
Recording sessions are also a great opportunity to evaluate one’s own practical
application skills. (I highly recommend it!)
This bear and session was most definitely giving me joy. And
the way I expressed it was through my words. However, I knew those words of
praise were really for my benefit and not the bear’s. In general, I tend to be a quiet trainer.
This is for several reasons. One reason is that some animals can get highly
aroused by our excited vocalizations. High levels of arousal can lead to
undesired behaviors such as aggressive behavior and sexual behavior (that’s another
story involving a monkey I will share later.) The other reason, is that I am quite aware
that what is teaching my animal to give me desired behavior is delivery of the reinforcer. And if I can
deliver that reinforcer in direct conjunction with the desired behavior, that
is what is communicating to the animal what behavior should be repeated.
There are times when my words may be used to “bridge”
behavior. Or a word may be used as a verbal cue. However, I am usually not very
chatty when intentionally teaching/using a bridge or cue so that they will be
salient. In this case, I knew any verbal cues would be changed (English is not
the native language of the country where this bear lives.) I also knew I was
right there to deliver the reinforcer and my hand moving forward quickly with
the food would act as the bridging stimulus for the behavior. This was the only
thing that really mattered…..the precise
timing of the delivery of the reinforcers to communicate the desired
behavior was presented. And despite all
my chit chat and lack of succinct auditory
bridge, the bear did learn to lie down on a visual cue. Overtime the cue can be made more subtle. But
overall this was not bad for one session.
And the trainers were new to creating behaviors and putting them on cue.
So, should I have learned to pipe down a bit when training
this bear? Here is my take on it. While I am no stranger to precise use of a
bridging stimulus and giving clear verbal cues, I was fully aware of what was
actually influencing the behavior…. delivery of the reinforcer. I knew the
words were me expressing my enjoyment in the moment and pretty much had no
significance to the bear. Eventually we
chose a hand cue, so words did not matter for learning this behavior. In fact, it is one of the cool things about reinforcement,
it is a universal language. And yes, I think more importantly we (meaning bear
and trainers) definitely had fun. I will certainly lighten up and let trainers
enjoy their own verbal behavior when I have confidence it isn’t interfering
with what we are trying to accomplish. Training should be fun and in reviewing
the video of the last three weeks of consulting I hear lots of laughter and I
see lots of behavior goals met. Mission accomplished this time, even through the chatter.
Barbara Heidenreich
Copyright 2017
Barbara Heidenreich has been a professional animal trainer since 1990. Her company Barbara’s Force Free Animal Training (www.BarbarasFFAT.com) provides animal training DVDs, books, webinars and workshops. She has been a featured speaker in over twenty countries and has been published in nine languages. Barbara works with the companion animal community and also consults on animal training in zoos.
Barbara Heidenreich has been a professional animal trainer since 1990. Her company Barbara’s Force Free Animal Training (www.BarbarasFFAT.com) provides animal training DVDs, books, webinars and workshops. She has been a featured speaker in over twenty countries and has been published in nine languages. Barbara works with the companion animal community and also consults on animal training in zoos.
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