[nagdu] Clicker Treats RE: dog corrections

[Julie J]

Tracy,

There seems to be a lot of variety in how people use clicker methods.  I 
think in the purest form click means treat, every time all the time.  I have 
heard of your random reinforcement schedule too and for the same reasons you 
stated.   Personally when I click I always give a treat.  However I do not 
click every single time a behavior is done, except for in the very beginning 
of a new concept.  So for me the random reinforcement comes in when I click 
and not when I give the treat.

If it's working for you go with it, no need to fix it if it aint broken. 
*smile*

Julie



----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Tracy Carcione" <carcione at access.net>
To: "NAGDU Mailing List,the National Association of Guide Dog Users" 
<nagdu at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Monday, August 31, 2009 9:27 AM
Subject: Re: [nagdu] Clicker Treats RE: dog corrections


> It is my understanding that, once the dog understands the behavior being
> clicked for, one is supposed to sometimes click with no treat.  For
> instance, Ben loves his cave under my desk at work, and he takes a while
> to come out when I call him.  So I call him, and click and treat when he
> comes out and touches my hand.  So I thought that the next step is to call
> him, and, sometimes, click and treat, and other times just click.  Then I
> can gradually phase out the click.  This is what I thought was sometimes
> called "The Las Vegas method", because the dog never knows when he might
> hit the jackpot, so he will keep playing the game, just in case.
>
> Of course, Ben is very clever, so if I skip the treat more than once in a
> row, he stops coming out again.  Have I said that he's a brat?
>
> Have I got the method right, or am I missing something?
> Tracy
>
>
>> That is very interesting that you do not always use the treats with the
>> clicker.  AT GDB, they told us that we must use a treat every time that 
>> we
>> click the clicker, even if it was an accident.  We were strongly
>> discouraged
>> from doing clicker training around other dogs.  I was reminded why the
>> other
>> day when I was in a pet shop with a training area.  Someone was doing
>> clicker training with their dog, and Lexia was very interested.  Luckily,
>> I
>> was not working her, as she was there for her bath.  I don't use clicker
>> training too much as sometimes Lexia tries too hard for it and misses the
>> point as she tries too hard to please in order to get the treat, but it
>> certainly works well for teaching new commands.
>
>
>
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