Reinforcers and Their Values

I’m still experimenting with finding Jackie’s “100 dollar bill.”  Finding a high value reinforcer is important for rewarding high drive for performance and for building prompt and repeatable responses to cues.  We know it is helpful to use a variety of treats, from high value, medium, and lower value, to keep things interesting and also to have a high value reinforcer to teach new skills, or reward when extra effort is offered or desired.

For Jackie’s first couple of days I had my beloved lamb loaf and Hebrew national hot dogs cut up into medallions, as well as some store-bought soft mini treats on hand. However with all the distractions, new environment, and just general melancholy a sensitive Border collie goes through the first several days of adoption I quickly realized I’m going to have to up my reinforcer game.  Mostly Jackie likes everything I’ve been offering her but it is clear none of it is her equivalent of a 100 dollar bill.  So today I prepared some boiled chicken and flank steak cut up into mini one-bite pieces.  The chicken seems to be the highest-valued reinforcer as we are continuing to reinforce mistake-free potty habits, capture looking at me while going for a walk, and coming to me on her own or when I call her name. Of course I am continuing to reinforce good potty behavior, taking nothing for granted and wanting to put relieving herself on a cue for those times I truly need her to “hurry up and go potty!” 

Time will tell but probably, like many Border collies, the highest value reinforcer will become the work—agility or herding for example— itself.  But I will need to stack value to a reinforcer I can minutely control, in order to teach new habits or increase promptness or duration of a behavior in the education process. At this point in our relationship, during run-and-play, anytime Jackie spontaneously comes over to me and makes eye contact I give her a treat and verbal praise and petting, then release her with “Okay!” and make a “ssshwsh” sound that Jackie’s foster mom used with her.  I feel there’s a way to harness the power of that “ssshwsh” noise since Jackie is already super reactive to it— bolting off away from me in an extremely drivey display of speed.  Will keep you posted if I come up with any ideas, but for now I’m using it as a fun game to reinforce desired behavior during playtime.

Play, play, and more play:

Pearls:

• The individual learner decides what is valued as a reinforcer, and how much value each reinforcer has
• Experimenting with a range of reinforcer treats can be interesting, and it’s good to have lower value and higher value treats available
• Primary, high value reinforces (like herding for a Border collie) can be stacked with education into a small, easy-to-deliver controlled treat
• Question to ponder: what is a good way to use the “ssshwsh” noise for future training since Jackie already seems to be stimulated by this particular verbal cue?