A great look into behavior. Refreshing in creative potential in that it’s given in neither the context of marketing nor software.
Karen might be an inspiration to BJ as she lays out a very digestible framework, which appears to have effectively given structure to an artform I hadn’t considered for its complexity.
Laws, Methods, and comprehensive classification (at least from my novice perspective) of seemingly each and every technique we might utilize to alter our subject’s behavior.
I can already see some mistakes I’ve made in my first behavior shaping experiment. Namely, that I’ve told my subject that I would be trying to shape their behavior and I was about to move forward with an “improvement” to the first experiment with a new method using negative reinforcement. Not cool.
I also noticed some ways in which I had used good techniques when trying to shape my own behavior. Particularly the 10th Law of Shaping which asks a trainer to “end on a high note” so that we can keep some momentum going for our next training session. I can remember running races in high school, or even workouts leading up to a race where I would try to conserve energy while maintaining striking distance on someone in front of me and then trying testing my ability to catch up and overtake them. By doing this it never felt like I was ever losing energy and at the end of an event I would at the very least feel like I had been gaining ground for next time.
Sadly, I can barely catch the chinese deliveryman these days but I still try, and it’s great to have this framework to apply in the future.
Ji Hyun Moon:
October 13th, 2011 at 6:15 pm
This reading allows me to think over the way how to change habituated behaviors from effective ways. Also, the author bias a fact that Nothing is simple to change people’s behaviors that already embed on part of their lives. Comparing to training animals (mainly here dogs, and dolphins), training a human is carefully done with some principles, she introduces through the book, which assist people, who don’t have few experience before about training self, pets, or a self-control management. Writer also explains the principles of shaping your behaviors with describing some specific cases, when people often meet in their lives.
First time when I see the title, I could not get the meaning that even makes me more confused a point of reading this book, in a context of learning about Quantifying-Self. However, after reading the book, I realize that animal and human are in a same category, which is very simple nature being, and easily follow up the way pleasure, easy, simple, and instinctive. Thus, writer compares training people to change and shape their behaviors to tame kids.
The title, ‘Don’t shoot the Dog’ implies that using a reinforcement is a better way to aim you seek. As the first chapter says reinforcements are better than rewards, and a progressive changing for shaping of behaviors. Mostly, the writer refers a training is a creative progress, successful with a positive reinforcement. Even thought she introduces one of methods to rid of what you don’t want or harmful to someone else is a negative reinforcement, such as punishments, and an extinction, human nature are not born to obey, the writer concludes that the best method of restraining your habituated behaviors is a positive reinforcement. This positive reinforcement brings up a motivation, by which people reawaken to assure your pattern of activities, languages that may be overwhelmingly expected from others and need to be redirected. The motivation will courage people to success training for yourself, or for your pets.
Although writer introduces eight methods of training, the life span is complex, and some problems might be solved by a combination of each methods.
The eight methods are
shooting the animal – eliminate the physical object, or subject : extinction
Punishment – human tendency : domination
Negative reinforcement : traditional and conventional system, sometimes works but the writer does not prefer that way, unless with a particular place needs, it stirs up with prompt result and visibly we can see the result.
Extinction : especially in case of language, and verbal behaviors.
Train an incompatible behavior: for our ‘Smile project’, I think we were succeed in the part that we change people’s behavior to keep their food in a refrigerator, slightly by motivating an incompatible behavior: post it the smile Post-it papers to track your health food with others. Actually this behavior replaces that people has to label their name and date of purchase on food with a regular, simple tape.
Put the Behavior on Cue
Shape the Absence of the Behavior
Change the Motivation : In a case of our smile project, for the second direction, we need to set up the motivation for people to recognize their circumstance needs to be change. As the writer explains applies a combination of methods with a complex case , motivation will be set by well-awareness of trainees’ present state, and the priority to change and shape behaviors. Furthermore, with all methods announced by the writer, we need to set up exceptional, special events that might trigger people to get more excited and stimulus a self-motivation under a control.
Ryan:
October 14th, 2011 at 12:03 am
“Don’t shoot the Dog” is an informative book for understanding how to use reinforcements both positive and negative in persuasion in practical and effective ways. I really enjoyed the broad application of the behavioral training from dogs to people. One piece of advice that stood out to me was the importance of temporal reinforcement. In my last behavioral experiment I used this tactic to reinforce the mood of my subjects.
Temporal reinforcement suggests that there is a time between when the behavior is completed and when you administer the positive or negative reinforcement. Your goal is to make the reinforcement as close as you can to the completed behavior. In my experiment, I asked people to text me their mood. When they sent me their answer I would respond with in the minute to reinforce their mental state. My results from my experience came in at a 90% response rate in comparison to my last study at a mere 20%. The positive feed back that I received from my subjects after sending my reinforcement text also quadrupled.
I realized that reinforcements can be used for behaviors happening one or many times. This book inspired me to think of new ways to tackle my designs. Everything we do is a behavior that is coupled with a desire that based on our ability and motivation. When one designs something we tend to forget about the minimal behaviors the user has to do in order to interact and use whatever we designed. The big question to ask in all designs is “ what do I want my user to do?” Basically, “what behavior do I want my subject to do?” I look forward to utilizing these behavioral tactics in my designs.
Doug:
October 14th, 2011 at 12:14 am
Karen Pryor is a good writer, has a clearly established method for using positive reinforcements and has a wealth of experience in the field. I found myself agreeing with her almost all of the time during the reading.
She explains the 8 methods for getting rid of a behavior you don’t want:
1. “Shoot the animal”
2. Punishment
3. Negative reinforcement
4. Extinction
5. Train an incompatible behavior
6. Put the behavior on cue
7. “Shape the absence”
8. Change the motivation
Of these, the last four are based on positive reinforcement and therefor her favorite. Interestingly enough, she doesn’t deny that occasionally methods 1-4 are a reality in life.
Interestingly enough, i found the last paragraph in the last chapter we were assigned to be a letdown (flying in the face of her idea of ending on a high note). In it, she talks about people dealing with addiction issues. After over a hundred pages of her laying out very precise actions for a variety of situations (a majority of which involve animal training), she makes the very vague statement, “I think the way to tackle addictive behavior in yourself- and this is one situation where the subject may very well be the most effective trainer- is to study all eight methods and find some way , with the exception of punishment, to engage in frequent application of every single one.” This shows a disappointing lacking of insight, which lowers her credibility. Why study all this about dolphins when her advice can drop off so decisively in complex human situations? Is this not the end goal?
Outside of that, I found the reading to be good. The first chapters on Reinforcements and Shaping were clear and logical. It makes it all seem quite reasonable, especially in situations such as raising a child. In fact, the whole reading flies in the face of the recent sensation surrounding the book “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother.”
One final random idea she throws out there that I will end on is the idea of making future parents be required to train a chicken before having a child. The idea being that if you can positively reinforce an animal that is quite simple, does not understand your language and requires you to show a certain degree of patience then you are ready for parenthood. What an interesting thing to consider, a nation where this was in effect, with people and their chickens everywhere…
Frankie:
October 16th, 2011 at 12:28 am
I enjoyed reading this book more than I thought I would. Many of the ideas that I was exposed to in introductory psychology classes I took in the past, such as positive reinforcement, were explained and demonstrated in a way that motivated me to want to experiment with it.
The author clarified the difference between rewards and punishment vs. positive and negative reinforcement. I never considered them to be different before. Another idea that stood out to me was that positive reinforcement is something that is more effective with variable reinforcement schedules and long term behavior is more likely to stick without constant reinforcement, while negative reinforcement requires more a steady schedule to be effective.
One particularly memorable story was about the training game where a trainee’s hands were stuck in his pockets unintentionally. Playing the “Training Game” seems like it would be a fun exercise and great learning experience. I would probably be a good trainee, and not a particularly good trainer.
After the reading, I feel a lot more sensitive to situations where positive reinforcement may be useful and more aware of how “shaping” occurs. I intend to refer to some of the principles from this reading in my future designs.
Jamie:
October 16th, 2011 at 4:46 am
After reading 3 Chapters of the book, I have to say that while I found parts of it interesting, I strongly disliked the author’s tone. I felt like when she wasn’t speaking about her time as a dolphin trainer, she was making a lot of generalizations and came across as extremely judgmental.
Her generalizations about humanists, to wall street workers, to the way young mothers treat their crying children in the supermarket all felt unnecessary within the book. I felt that 50% of the time i was just chumming through superfluous text. But overall, I found it informative, though so condensed with anecdotes, it’s was hard for me to hold a the core essential information together. (at least in the first two chapters) As a result, I tried to record while reading through it the main points. (Below)
Notes
We expect people to do the right ting without reward
We assume people should know better and punish long after behavior has occurred
Maintain an already-learned behavior do not reinforce on regular basis, reinforce only occasionally and on an unpredictable basis
the rarer and more unpredictable these moments/reinforcers, the more powerful they will be
give consistent reward if it’s a puzzle
delayed-start phenomenon = procrastination
treat w/ steps with treats
accidental reinforcement –> superstition
10 laws of shaping:
1. raise criteria in small increments
2. train only 1 beh. at a time
3. vary the schedule of reinforcement (she’s so redundant)
4. when learning new criterion, relax old ones
5. stay ahead- ready for break throughs (gifted students bored)
6. don’t change trainers mid-training
7. try other methods
8. don’t interrupt sessions
9. review if shaping deteriorates
10. Quit while you’re ahead – end on a high note (or easy)
Shaping tips
1. targeting (following a target: fist/flag etc.)
2. mimicking
3. modeling (standing behind golfer showing them swing)
Ending behavior
1. ‘shoot the animal’ remove the animal from situation
2. punishment
3. negative reinforcement (remove unpleasant when desired behavior occurs)
4. extinction (wait for beh to fade)
5. train incompatible behavior (can’t do both at the same time. when scared, do this)
6. put behavior on cue (turn unwanted beh into something u can command)
7. reinforce all desired behaviors (when u don’t have anything specific u want to reinforce, just really want them to stop what they are doing)
8. change motivation (stop chewing gum- makes u look cheap) – focus on why this behavior happens, how do you fundamentally change the person to stop this action.
Valentina:
October 16th, 2011 at 4:45 pm
I really enjoy this reading. I realized that any behavior could be analyzed using Pryor’s methods and as Frankie was saying I felt like taking a psychology class.
There are certain things that I found interesting and very easy to implement when changing behaviors. It was difficult to compare some of the dolphins behaviors and connect them to humans, but at the same time, I was always thinking that couldn’t be a better example. If she was able to train dolphins, it shouldn’t be hard to train humans. The secret is to keep the experiment in secret to the “animal” you’re playing with.
Humans are creatures of habits, and this reading reinforce this statement. We can shape them by different methods to do what we want. But I think that the text speaks a lot about the methods but not too much about the combination of them. Even in a small experiment is necessary to apply different techniques and to test and be 100% aware of the situation to be able to become a good trainer. I found more difficult if the “animal” you are going to train, is an adult instead of a kid because in some way, kids are predictable, but adults could react in any way.
Paul:
October 16th, 2011 at 5:33 pm
I really enjoyed the readings from this book! There are just so many things that could be applied to the design of a self-care system – the approach to stopping behaviours from occurring through the analysis of motivation/root cause, the careful shaping of behaviour over time through small incremental changes, the need for the exact timing of the right kind of feedback. I almost think that the best way to discuss the impact of this article in class would be to bring some concepts put forward by Pryor in the book into our model of our first order feedback loop. As we step through the feedback look we could also step through the types of feedback likely to make us want to keep going through the loop e.g. what type of feedback is likely to make us want to sense something, how should we reinforce positive changes that are sensed, how do we offer feedback on action, and encouragement when we encounter disturbances. I really feel like I learned a lot from this book – it’s a little weird and a little Skinner-esque, but valuable nonetheless.
Carl:
October 16th, 2011 at 11:02 pm
“Don’t Shoot the Dog” was a good read. I agree that the general tone of the author was that of an animal trainer, there are many insights that can be learned. In the First chapter I enjoyed the discussion of reinforcement size. I wondered if the determination that 80 reinforcements per day was the maximum number of reinforcements that were effective in affecting the subjects interest applied to humans. This reinforced (see what i did there) her animal trainer tone.
Jackpots were also an interesting idea. Perhaps this introduces the element of chance. I liked that Pryor said she did know really know why a jackpot can have such long lasting effects. Is there a health or well-being related jackpot? I am not so sure. But the way people respond to jackpots indicates that there might much more to learn, that could be applied.
Cues and Triggers are powerful tools. I was reading the chapters this past weekend on an flight back home for a family wedding. Going back into my parental environment seemed particularly interesting after the read. I started to seem my parents as needing training (I still kind of wanted to shoot them both though). I thought about their health habits. They are super into supplements and vitamins, my mom more so than my dad. I cannot figure out why my dad is so into it. He see few benefits (as far as i can tell) but he still does it. Then i realized that my mom already has my dad trained to do it. She puts all the vitamins right next to the sink. Right where he will both see and take them. I am not sure he would do it on his own though.
Craig:
October 17th, 2011 at 1:47 am
Pryor’s “Don’t Shoot The Dog” is a great read. What I found to be most striking was how the elements of timing and quantity formed so much of the foundation of the positive and negative reinforcers as well as the shaping techniques. Much of what she describes in terms of rewards and actions to encourage behavior change are fairly intuitive. If a dog does something good, give it a treat. If it does something bad, let the dog know. What isn’t as intuitive is when precisely all of these actions should occur and how much reward/punishment is appropriate. We can all try to promote or inhibit a range of behaviors, but if said reinforcers are too soon, as in the child rearing examples, or too late, as in standard punishment examples, the effect is somewhat worthless. If the reward is too much, as in the panda carrot eating example, it throws everything off. And if the behavior is achieved, and the reward is easily obtained, changes need to be made according to the subjects new level of ability. It’s a constant ebb and flow that requires an intense amount of observation and preparedness. Ultimately, it comes down to being poised and vigilant about dishing out the necessary reward at the most significant time.
Suvarchala:
October 17th, 2011 at 1:47 pm
The Pryor reading was extremely timely and relevant, given that situations involving people require careful consideration almost every day, especially when working with groups. After reading it, I realized that I fell into the punishment for result category and the readings helped to see how little they actually work and in fact can have a negative effect. It was interesting to learn about positive reinforcements and the little nuances that accompany them such as timing, conditioning etc. It brought up the many discussions my husband and I have had on this topic. Given our cultural differences, we have very different approaches to motivation and behaviour change. In India, we use punishment and negative reinforcement as much as or more than positive reinforcement while Eric as an Australian, subscribes very little to the first two and puts his faith in the latter. I’ve also been able to see that he is a much better leader and able to get the results he wants because he is a natural at positive reinforcement. My way of ‘punishing’ has gotten results too but as the author points out, it does not guarantee that the behaviour will be produced in the future.
I also loved the idea that teaching kids to buy presents makes them better at positive reinforcement. It requires the skills of learning to observe people, understanding what they relate to and gifting them things that can evoke the feelings of p.r in them.
In talking about untraining behaviours, the part about punishing ourselves for not doing a certain behaviour or for doing a behaviour like procrastination. I was really able to relate to the example of putting something off and then hating myself for it. I’m looking forward to using this knowledge to change this behaviour around with P.R.
All in all, this has been a very useful set of readings with immediate practical applications. My dog Chaos has gotten into the habit of running into the room and peering into the computer screen everytime she hears a skype call. On hearing my voice, she barks continuously till someone shuts her up with a banana. Apart from associating the sound of the skype ring with a treat (conditioned p.r), we have obviously encouraged her behaviour by first cooing about how cute it is and then rewarding her barks with her favourite food. Would love to see how I can untrain that behaviour of barking.
Fred:
October 11th, 2011 at 9:39 pm
A great look into behavior. Refreshing in creative potential in that it’s given in neither the context of marketing nor software.
Karen might be an inspiration to BJ as she lays out a very digestible framework, which appears to have effectively given structure to an artform I hadn’t considered for its complexity.
Laws, Methods, and comprehensive classification (at least from my novice perspective) of seemingly each and every technique we might utilize to alter our subject’s behavior.
I can already see some mistakes I’ve made in my first behavior shaping experiment. Namely, that I’ve told my subject that I would be trying to shape their behavior and I was about to move forward with an “improvement” to the first experiment with a new method using negative reinforcement. Not cool.
I also noticed some ways in which I had used good techniques when trying to shape my own behavior. Particularly the 10th Law of Shaping which asks a trainer to “end on a high note” so that we can keep some momentum going for our next training session. I can remember running races in high school, or even workouts leading up to a race where I would try to conserve energy while maintaining striking distance on someone in front of me and then trying testing my ability to catch up and overtake them. By doing this it never felt like I was ever losing energy and at the end of an event I would at the very least feel like I had been gaining ground for next time.
Sadly, I can barely catch the chinese deliveryman these days but I still try, and it’s great to have this framework to apply in the future.
Ji Hyun Moon:
October 13th, 2011 at 6:15 pm
This reading allows me to think over the way how to change habituated behaviors from effective ways. Also, the author bias a fact that Nothing is simple to change people’s behaviors that already embed on part of their lives. Comparing to training animals (mainly here dogs, and dolphins), training a human is carefully done with some principles, she introduces through the book, which assist people, who don’t have few experience before about training self, pets, or a self-control management. Writer also explains the principles of shaping your behaviors with describing some specific cases, when people often meet in their lives.
First time when I see the title, I could not get the meaning that even makes me more confused a point of reading this book, in a context of learning about Quantifying-Self. However, after reading the book, I realize that animal and human are in a same category, which is very simple nature being, and easily follow up the way pleasure, easy, simple, and instinctive. Thus, writer compares training people to change and shape their behaviors to tame kids.
The title, ‘Don’t shoot the Dog’ implies that using a reinforcement is a better way to aim you seek. As the first chapter says reinforcements are better than rewards, and a progressive changing for shaping of behaviors. Mostly, the writer refers a training is a creative progress, successful with a positive reinforcement. Even thought she introduces one of methods to rid of what you don’t want or harmful to someone else is a negative reinforcement, such as punishments, and an extinction, human nature are not born to obey, the writer concludes that the best method of restraining your habituated behaviors is a positive reinforcement. This positive reinforcement brings up a motivation, by which people reawaken to assure your pattern of activities, languages that may be overwhelmingly expected from others and need to be redirected. The motivation will courage people to success training for yourself, or for your pets.
Although writer introduces eight methods of training, the life span is complex, and some problems might be solved by a combination of each methods.
The eight methods are
shooting the animal – eliminate the physical object, or subject : extinction
Punishment – human tendency : domination
Negative reinforcement : traditional and conventional system, sometimes works but the writer does not prefer that way, unless with a particular place needs, it stirs up with prompt result and visibly we can see the result.
Extinction : especially in case of language, and verbal behaviors.
Train an incompatible behavior: for our ‘Smile project’, I think we were succeed in the part that we change people’s behavior to keep their food in a refrigerator, slightly by motivating an incompatible behavior: post it the smile Post-it papers to track your health food with others. Actually this behavior replaces that people has to label their name and date of purchase on food with a regular, simple tape.
Put the Behavior on Cue
Shape the Absence of the Behavior
Change the Motivation : In a case of our smile project, for the second direction, we need to set up the motivation for people to recognize their circumstance needs to be change. As the writer explains applies a combination of methods with a complex case , motivation will be set by well-awareness of trainees’ present state, and the priority to change and shape behaviors. Furthermore, with all methods announced by the writer, we need to set up exceptional, special events that might trigger people to get more excited and stimulus a self-motivation under a control.
Ryan:
October 14th, 2011 at 12:03 am
“Don’t shoot the Dog” is an informative book for understanding how to use reinforcements both positive and negative in persuasion in practical and effective ways. I really enjoyed the broad application of the behavioral training from dogs to people. One piece of advice that stood out to me was the importance of temporal reinforcement. In my last behavioral experiment I used this tactic to reinforce the mood of my subjects.
Temporal reinforcement suggests that there is a time between when the behavior is completed and when you administer the positive or negative reinforcement. Your goal is to make the reinforcement as close as you can to the completed behavior. In my experiment, I asked people to text me their mood. When they sent me their answer I would respond with in the minute to reinforce their mental state. My results from my experience came in at a 90% response rate in comparison to my last study at a mere 20%. The positive feed back that I received from my subjects after sending my reinforcement text also quadrupled.
I realized that reinforcements can be used for behaviors happening one or many times. This book inspired me to think of new ways to tackle my designs. Everything we do is a behavior that is coupled with a desire that based on our ability and motivation. When one designs something we tend to forget about the minimal behaviors the user has to do in order to interact and use whatever we designed. The big question to ask in all designs is “ what do I want my user to do?” Basically, “what behavior do I want my subject to do?” I look forward to utilizing these behavioral tactics in my designs.
Doug:
October 14th, 2011 at 12:14 am
Karen Pryor is a good writer, has a clearly established method for using positive reinforcements and has a wealth of experience in the field. I found myself agreeing with her almost all of the time during the reading.
She explains the 8 methods for getting rid of a behavior you don’t want:
1. “Shoot the animal”
2. Punishment
3. Negative reinforcement
4. Extinction
5. Train an incompatible behavior
6. Put the behavior on cue
7. “Shape the absence”
8. Change the motivation
Of these, the last four are based on positive reinforcement and therefor her favorite. Interestingly enough, she doesn’t deny that occasionally methods 1-4 are a reality in life.
Interestingly enough, i found the last paragraph in the last chapter we were assigned to be a letdown (flying in the face of her idea of ending on a high note). In it, she talks about people dealing with addiction issues. After over a hundred pages of her laying out very precise actions for a variety of situations (a majority of which involve animal training), she makes the very vague statement, “I think the way to tackle addictive behavior in yourself- and this is one situation where the subject may very well be the most effective trainer- is to study all eight methods and find some way , with the exception of punishment, to engage in frequent application of every single one.” This shows a disappointing lacking of insight, which lowers her credibility. Why study all this about dolphins when her advice can drop off so decisively in complex human situations? Is this not the end goal?
Outside of that, I found the reading to be good. The first chapters on Reinforcements and Shaping were clear and logical. It makes it all seem quite reasonable, especially in situations such as raising a child. In fact, the whole reading flies in the face of the recent sensation surrounding the book “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother.”
One final random idea she throws out there that I will end on is the idea of making future parents be required to train a chicken before having a child. The idea being that if you can positively reinforce an animal that is quite simple, does not understand your language and requires you to show a certain degree of patience then you are ready for parenthood. What an interesting thing to consider, a nation where this was in effect, with people and their chickens everywhere…
Frankie:
October 16th, 2011 at 12:28 am
I enjoyed reading this book more than I thought I would. Many of the ideas that I was exposed to in introductory psychology classes I took in the past, such as positive reinforcement, were explained and demonstrated in a way that motivated me to want to experiment with it.
The author clarified the difference between rewards and punishment vs. positive and negative reinforcement. I never considered them to be different before. Another idea that stood out to me was that positive reinforcement is something that is more effective with variable reinforcement schedules and long term behavior is more likely to stick without constant reinforcement, while negative reinforcement requires more a steady schedule to be effective.
One particularly memorable story was about the training game where a trainee’s hands were stuck in his pockets unintentionally. Playing the “Training Game” seems like it would be a fun exercise and great learning experience. I would probably be a good trainee, and not a particularly good trainer.
After the reading, I feel a lot more sensitive to situations where positive reinforcement may be useful and more aware of how “shaping” occurs. I intend to refer to some of the principles from this reading in my future designs.
Jamie:
October 16th, 2011 at 4:46 am
After reading 3 Chapters of the book, I have to say that while I found parts of it interesting, I strongly disliked the author’s tone. I felt like when she wasn’t speaking about her time as a dolphin trainer, she was making a lot of generalizations and came across as extremely judgmental.
Her generalizations about humanists, to wall street workers, to the way young mothers treat their crying children in the supermarket all felt unnecessary within the book. I felt that 50% of the time i was just chumming through superfluous text. But overall, I found it informative, though so condensed with anecdotes, it’s was hard for me to hold a the core essential information together. (at least in the first two chapters) As a result, I tried to record while reading through it the main points. (Below)
Notes
We expect people to do the right ting without reward
We assume people should know better and punish long after behavior has occurred
Maintain an already-learned behavior do not reinforce on regular basis, reinforce only occasionally and on an unpredictable basis
the rarer and more unpredictable these moments/reinforcers, the more powerful they will be
give consistent reward if it’s a puzzle
delayed-start phenomenon = procrastination
treat w/ steps with treats
accidental reinforcement –> superstition
10 laws of shaping:
1. raise criteria in small increments
2. train only 1 beh. at a time
3. vary the schedule of reinforcement (she’s so redundant)
4. when learning new criterion, relax old ones
5. stay ahead- ready for break throughs (gifted students bored)
6. don’t change trainers mid-training
7. try other methods
8. don’t interrupt sessions
9. review if shaping deteriorates
10. Quit while you’re ahead – end on a high note (or easy)
Shaping tips
1. targeting (following a target: fist/flag etc.)
2. mimicking
3. modeling (standing behind golfer showing them swing)
Ending behavior
1. ‘shoot the animal’ remove the animal from situation
2. punishment
3. negative reinforcement (remove unpleasant when desired behavior occurs)
4. extinction (wait for beh to fade)
5. train incompatible behavior (can’t do both at the same time. when scared, do this)
6. put behavior on cue (turn unwanted beh into something u can command)
7. reinforce all desired behaviors (when u don’t have anything specific u want to reinforce, just really want them to stop what they are doing)
8. change motivation (stop chewing gum- makes u look cheap) – focus on why this behavior happens, how do you fundamentally change the person to stop this action.
Valentina:
October 16th, 2011 at 4:45 pm
I really enjoy this reading. I realized that any behavior could be analyzed using Pryor’s methods and as Frankie was saying I felt like taking a psychology class.
There are certain things that I found interesting and very easy to implement when changing behaviors. It was difficult to compare some of the dolphins behaviors and connect them to humans, but at the same time, I was always thinking that couldn’t be a better example. If she was able to train dolphins, it shouldn’t be hard to train humans. The secret is to keep the experiment in secret to the “animal” you’re playing with.
Humans are creatures of habits, and this reading reinforce this statement. We can shape them by different methods to do what we want. But I think that the text speaks a lot about the methods but not too much about the combination of them. Even in a small experiment is necessary to apply different techniques and to test and be 100% aware of the situation to be able to become a good trainer. I found more difficult if the “animal” you are going to train, is an adult instead of a kid because in some way, kids are predictable, but adults could react in any way.
Paul:
October 16th, 2011 at 5:33 pm
I really enjoyed the readings from this book! There are just so many things that could be applied to the design of a self-care system – the approach to stopping behaviours from occurring through the analysis of motivation/root cause, the careful shaping of behaviour over time through small incremental changes, the need for the exact timing of the right kind of feedback. I almost think that the best way to discuss the impact of this article in class would be to bring some concepts put forward by Pryor in the book into our model of our first order feedback loop. As we step through the feedback look we could also step through the types of feedback likely to make us want to keep going through the loop e.g. what type of feedback is likely to make us want to sense something, how should we reinforce positive changes that are sensed, how do we offer feedback on action, and encouragement when we encounter disturbances. I really feel like I learned a lot from this book – it’s a little weird and a little Skinner-esque, but valuable nonetheless.
Carl:
October 16th, 2011 at 11:02 pm
“Don’t Shoot the Dog” was a good read. I agree that the general tone of the author was that of an animal trainer, there are many insights that can be learned. In the First chapter I enjoyed the discussion of reinforcement size. I wondered if the determination that 80 reinforcements per day was the maximum number of reinforcements that were effective in affecting the subjects interest applied to humans. This reinforced (see what i did there) her animal trainer tone.
Jackpots were also an interesting idea. Perhaps this introduces the element of chance. I liked that Pryor said she did know really know why a jackpot can have such long lasting effects. Is there a health or well-being related jackpot? I am not so sure. But the way people respond to jackpots indicates that there might much more to learn, that could be applied.
Cues and Triggers are powerful tools. I was reading the chapters this past weekend on an flight back home for a family wedding. Going back into my parental environment seemed particularly interesting after the read. I started to seem my parents as needing training (I still kind of wanted to shoot them both though). I thought about their health habits. They are super into supplements and vitamins, my mom more so than my dad. I cannot figure out why my dad is so into it. He see few benefits (as far as i can tell) but he still does it. Then i realized that my mom already has my dad trained to do it. She puts all the vitamins right next to the sink. Right where he will both see and take them. I am not sure he would do it on his own though.
Craig:
October 17th, 2011 at 1:47 am
Pryor’s “Don’t Shoot The Dog” is a great read. What I found to be most striking was how the elements of timing and quantity formed so much of the foundation of the positive and negative reinforcers as well as the shaping techniques. Much of what she describes in terms of rewards and actions to encourage behavior change are fairly intuitive. If a dog does something good, give it a treat. If it does something bad, let the dog know. What isn’t as intuitive is when precisely all of these actions should occur and how much reward/punishment is appropriate. We can all try to promote or inhibit a range of behaviors, but if said reinforcers are too soon, as in the child rearing examples, or too late, as in standard punishment examples, the effect is somewhat worthless. If the reward is too much, as in the panda carrot eating example, it throws everything off. And if the behavior is achieved, and the reward is easily obtained, changes need to be made according to the subjects new level of ability. It’s a constant ebb and flow that requires an intense amount of observation and preparedness. Ultimately, it comes down to being poised and vigilant about dishing out the necessary reward at the most significant time.
Suvarchala:
October 17th, 2011 at 1:47 pm
The Pryor reading was extremely timely and relevant, given that situations involving people require careful consideration almost every day, especially when working with groups. After reading it, I realized that I fell into the punishment for result category and the readings helped to see how little they actually work and in fact can have a negative effect. It was interesting to learn about positive reinforcements and the little nuances that accompany them such as timing, conditioning etc. It brought up the many discussions my husband and I have had on this topic. Given our cultural differences, we have very different approaches to motivation and behaviour change. In India, we use punishment and negative reinforcement as much as or more than positive reinforcement while Eric as an Australian, subscribes very little to the first two and puts his faith in the latter. I’ve also been able to see that he is a much better leader and able to get the results he wants because he is a natural at positive reinforcement. My way of ‘punishing’ has gotten results too but as the author points out, it does not guarantee that the behaviour will be produced in the future.
I also loved the idea that teaching kids to buy presents makes them better at positive reinforcement. It requires the skills of learning to observe people, understanding what they relate to and gifting them things that can evoke the feelings of p.r in them.
In talking about untraining behaviours, the part about punishing ourselves for not doing a certain behaviour or for doing a behaviour like procrastination. I was really able to relate to the example of putting something off and then hating myself for it. I’m looking forward to using this knowledge to change this behaviour around with P.R.
All in all, this has been a very useful set of readings with immediate practical applications. My dog Chaos has gotten into the habit of running into the room and peering into the computer screen everytime she hears a skype call. On hearing my voice, she barks continuously till someone shuts her up with a banana. Apart from associating the sound of the skype ring with a treat (conditioned p.r), we have obviously encouraged her behaviour by first cooing about how cute it is and then rewarding her barks with her favourite food. Would love to see how I can untrain that behaviour of barking.