Does the Click End the Behavior?

Does the Click End the Behavior?

It seems straightforward: we click to mark a desired behavior, and then we reinforce. The act of reinforcing the behavior necessitates a change in action: the horse eats the treat, the dog plays with its favorite toy, and the animal in the process of being reinforced no longer performs the behavior for which it was clicked. The click, therefore, ends the behavior.

Yet, is it true? The more a trainer explores the use of the clicker, the more he or she may begin to question this principle. After all, if you only click at the end of a behavior, are you also reinforcing "stop working"? How do we use an event marker if we wish the animal to keep going until it is cued to stop working?

Often when we find ourselves in these gray areas, we discover that the question we are asking is the wrong question. Rather than asking "Does the click end the behavior?" we need to ask "Is the click followed by a reinforcer

Can the click carry two meanings?: 1) yes, that is the behavior I want, and 2) please continue doing the behavior. Can it be both an event marker and a keep-going signal? Karen responds: "If you switch the click from being a marker signal to being a kind of encouragement or 'keep going' signal, you are going to be in trouble. When you give random clicks during a continuing behavior (while training a "stay" for example), unpaired with any other event, you separate the click from the reinforcer." Studies at the University of North Texas have demonstrated that to maintain the strength of the association of the click with the reinforcer, you need to keep those two items paired and associated in real time as much as possible, or the power of the click will be reduced until it is meaningless to the animal.

Sometimes, people click and also treat repeatedly during a long-duration behavior, but don't let the behavior stop. In this case the click continues to be paired with the reinforcer, but the click actually has no information in it at all, since it is not marking a clearly identifiable behavior. You have eliminated its main purpose, as a marker signal.

So, if the click must be maintained as an event marker, rather than a keep-going signal, and we don't want to click until the behavior ends, how do we build enduring behaviors?

For horse trainer Alexandra Kurland, the click always ends the behavior: but only temporarily. She writes, "Suppose your horse blasts forward into his usual fast trot, but then has a moment where the trot steadies and slows down. You click, and he stops. He stops BECAUSE the click marks the end of a unit of behavior. If he's going to collect his ‘paycheck,' it has to. So, now you pick up the trot again. The horse rushes off, but he's a clicker-wise animal. He knows he was just reinforced for something. He just doesn't know what. His trot steadies again, just for an instant, but that's all you need to click and say ‘Yes- that's what I wanted.' The horse stops, collects his paycheck, and then starts up again. Eating is relaxing, so the next time he picks up a trot, he's much calmer. Click! You mark that right away and give him a jackpot of a special goody. He's starting to figure out that trotting off slowly turns you into a vending machine. Once he's going into the trot calmly, you can begin to withhold the click and ask for a little more and then a little more." In other words, you build duration the way you would shape up any other behavior: in small increments.