Operant Conditioning

I am a positive reinforcement based dog trainer. That means that I strive to teach my dogs appropriate behavior and to do it without using applied an aversive.

What is an aversive? Well, in my world view, an aversive is something that a dog doesn't like. It can be something that causes pain or fear or discomfort. Granted, there are plenty of things in life that causes pain, fear and discomfort, but I do not want to be one of those things. And, I can train without them.

Most dog training is based on Operant Conditioning: Positive Reinforcement (R+), Negative Reinforcement (R-), Positive Punishment (P+) and Negative Punishment (P-). I use R+ and P- when training my dogs (I have listed them in green below). These are the two categories that do not contain aversives.

Quick guide:
Reinforcement  = increasing behavior 
Punishment  = reducing behavior
Negative = taking something away
Positive = adding something


Positive Reinforcement: This category means you are adding something in order to increase behavior. The thing that you are adding can be: food, attention/praise, and play.

Negative Reinforcement: This category means you are taking something away in order to increase behavior. This category uses aversives.

A classic example of this is when a rat is being shocked and it pushes on a bar to stop the shock. The shock increases the likelihood that the rat will press the bar. In dog training, an example is holding a choke collar tight until the dog sits and then loosening the collar when the dog sits.

Positive Punishment: This category means that you are adding something in order to decrease behavior. This category uses aversives.

An example of this is a shock collar to make the dog stop barking. Or, an electric fence to reduce the dog's wandering behavior.

Negative Punishment: This category, you are removing something in order to reduce behavior. This category can have aversives, but most often, aversives are not needed.

Examples of non-aversive uses in this category is a time out (you are removing freedom). Or, turning one's back on a jumping dog and walking away (you are removing attention).

Some other terms that I frequently use:

Desensitization and counterconditioning: This is, essentially, classical conditioning (for instance, pairing a feared object with food) while slowly decreasing the distance and amount of time the dog spends with the feared object. This technique is used a lot with fearful or reactive dogs.

Poisoned Cue, Fallout, Shutting Down: see the next post for more information about these.