If you have a dog that continues to move to the end of the leash, bark for attention, jump on people, or bump your leg at the dinner table despite your best efforts to teach an alternative behavior, there are many reasons it could be happening. One of those reasons could actually be that you are inadvertently teaching your dog a behavior chain – and those behaviors are part of it.
A behavior chain is a series of separate behaviors or response elements that must be performed in a particular order to result in reinforcement – that comes at the end of a chain. In purposefully teaching a chain, you would teach each behavior separately before putting them together. When you are putting them together, after the first behavior is complete, instead of marking that moment with a click or verbal marker, you would cue the next behavior before clicking and reinforcing, adding additional behaviors to the chain in the same way. If, in doing the behavior chain, there is a weak link, you’re best to stop practicing and go back to work on fluency with that specific behavior before adding it back into the chain.
There are two types of learning going on here. Classical conditioning is a reflexive type of learning where one stimulus acquires the capacity to evoke the same response as another stimulus. In other words, what happens AFTER something affects the emotional response to what happens first. Operant conditioning occurs when an animal learns whether or not to repeat and strengthen a behavior based upon the consequences of the behavior.
If you teach hand targeting with a high rate of reinforcement, then it is very probable that the behavior of hand targeting will evoke a feel-good response in the animal (because of its history of being followed by valued outcomes). So, the final behavior in the chain of lay down, lower head, and relax muscles for a specific duration is actually reinforced by asking your dog to hand target – which is followed by some sort of awesome consequence.
This is how it is done when in a planned training.
But it can occur so easily in everyday life too. Here are some common behavior chains that are inadvertently taught by well meaning owners.
Your dog moves to the end of the leash, at which time you tug the leash, call your dog back, or simply stop. And when your dog walks back to you, you may give him praise, a treat, and/or the opportunity to move forward again. You have just taught your dog to go to the end of the leash and move back to you!
Your dog jumps on you when you walk in the door, at which time you ask your dog to sit and then, when your dog sits, you give him attention, a toy or a treat. You’ve just taught your dog to jump, then sit!
Your dog bumps you when you are sitting at the table, at which time you ask your dog to lay down, and then offer your dog attention and possibly a table scrap. You’ve just taught your dog to bump you and then lay down!
This is one of the reasons why, teaching your dog ‘leave it’ depending on how you use it and what the cue means, can be ineffective at changing your dog’s behavior longer term. In essence, often what happens is the dog is taught to go sniff the flower which causes a person to say ‘leave it’ and then the dog comes back to the person and received reinforcement. Guess what…yep, a behavior chain!
A more effective approach is to come up with a plan that prevents the problem behavior from being set into motion to begin with (antecedent arrangement), while teaching your dog what you want him to do instead with a high value reinforcer.
