Hey folks, the last thread was closed down due to some confusion/miscommunication.

For those who expressed interest in that last forum, let's try here.

I'd like to discuss the princples of behavioral science.

This includes:
behavior chains (and how do un-do 'em)
extinction (and related issues)
escape/avoidance behavior
reinforcement/punishment
conditioned reinforcement/punishment
Types of discriminitive stimuli
stimulus generalization
response generalization
What is 'emotion'?
Operant conditioning (instrumental)
Respondend conditioning (classical)
How to weaken a response to a stimulus.
and much more! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

Behavioral science is just a study of responses and environment relationships.

Matters pertaining to the pay scale or value of a behavior analyst, the credibility of the science, or unfounded attacks upon an individual's talents don't count as "principles of behavioral science", so I won't answer or respond to those kinds of questions especially if they are just machismo bullying types of things.

I would prefer it, also, if you could respond publicly with questions rather than the PMs that I have recieved....although I am working on those. If I have to take the public abuse, then so do you!

Finally, if you are in another forum and someone brings up some sort of nit picky aspect regarding a behavioral principle behind a training procedure, just give me a PM and I would be interested in engaging in that discussion as well.

Could this be strike two?

kelton:
"Matters pertaining to the pay scale or value of a behavior analyst, the credibility of the science, or unfounded attacks upon an individual's talents don't count as "principles of behavioral science", so I won't answer or respond to those kinds of questions especially if they are just machismo bullying types of things."

This is trolling. Topic closed

I dont think much of people who claim to be behavioral trainers. The only placed this work has any effect is in the learning phase of training.

I have NEVER seen once behaviorist that I considered a good dog trainer. Not one !!!

My experience is that it looks good in an advertisement for someone trying to get business as a dog trainer. The fact is if they claim to be certified their certification is not worth the paper it’s written on.

I listen to NPR on the radio - on Saturdays here in WI they have this lady who has a PHD from the University of Wisconsin in Madison in animal science or some behavioral science mumbo jumbo. At the moment her name escapes me.

Let me tell you - SHE IS CLULESS. The only thing she does well is sell her books and giggle. She would not recommend a prong collar if her life depended on it. I listen to her telling people what to do for their dog and cat problems with the various behavioral techniques and find myself thinking - HOW STUPID IS THIS LADY !!! She is either dumb, or she lacks experience or she really does not realize that to produce the result these people want is going to require the people use her stupid REDIRECT technique about 3,545,789 times before the dog has a behavior change.

Behavioral techniques have just about zero chance of working on hard-high-drive dogs or on correction dogs with severe dominance problems.

Kevin Sheldahl says it all when he tells people that DOG TRAINING IS A CRAFT not a science. I am not going to allow members of this board to think there is some validity to Behavioral Science BS.

Kevin and I have about 65 years of experience in training dogs I have never met a Behaviorist with more than 5 years of experienced.

I have met clueless behavior analysts as well...and clueless dog trainers as I am sure everyone here has similar experiences. I think incompetence is rampant in all professions.

Heavy handed use of aversives (corrections) are definately not excluded from the field of behavioral science. In fact, ethical opinions on such matters has nothing to do with the field of behavioral science. If someone has a dogmatic opinion about "don't use prongs" or something, then they are just expressing some sort of personal vision....not a scientific one.

Pavlov, Skinner and most of the others have engaged in studies involving all sorts of unpleasant/aversive training scenarios. In fact, I would like to send some personal letters of apology to certain lab rats that have been involved in my own work!
I understand that some states still allow behavoir analysts to use electric shock as a punishment procedure on human clients. Granted, there are quite a few criteria that must be met in order to bring such a thing into the a procedure...but even with humans, behavioral science does not preclude such methods.

Behavioral science is an objective field, I can't help it if some folks choose to superimpose some sort of personal agenda on the matter. We are all human, so we tend to have many opinions regardless of our profession. Hard to get around it. Those opinions are not a part of the experimental analysis of behavior.

As an analogy. A chemist isn't an ethical preacher about the interactions between chemicals, and behavioral science isn't opinionated about the ethics between interactions of environment and organism. In fact, many introductory students to the field are often troubled by the rather cold and overly scientific approach to the topic.

Ethics certainly isn't a part of any serious behavioral science book. In fact, I would be very cautious before showing certain books to a lay person for fear that they would not be ready for the somewhat cruel things that have been done...and I wouldn't want to give that sort of impression!

 Quote:

Originally posted by Ed Frawley:
I listen to NPR on the radio - on Saturdays here in WI they have this lady who has a PHD from the University of Wisconsin in Madison in animal science or some behavioral science mumbo jumbo. At the moment her name escapes me.

Let me tell you - SHE IS CLULESS.

If you are talking about Patricia McConnell, I couldn't agree with you more--and that's based on my personal experience and the experience of a few people I met through my SchH club. But I hear she is excellent with cats <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> !

I have an analogy of mine also that I think fits this discussion, which has wandered across several long threads with never an attempt to aswer the valid questions of several posters by kelton.

Please follow this example, if you would. A person pops up onto a forum that involves the training and practice of race cars. There are several nationally ranked drivers who are forum posters. The new poster is well read on tires - and he posts very long threads about tires, and attempts to invoke forum members into asking him about tires. The drivers, being the ones that actually do the work that the forum is dedicated towards, ask the tire lecturer about his quailifications and experience - not an unreasonable question, giving that race care driver can results in injuries , if done incorrectly. A smart race car driver might want to only follow good advice, with provable, real world results.
After many attempts at questioning the evasive new poster, the best that the race car drivers can figure out is that the new posters car experience consists of driving to work.
Is the above scenario unreasonable? Is asking someone who posts virtual lectures in the car forum their credentials not a valid question? I think that advice on a racing forum coming from someone who drives the family car is not going to hold us in rapt awe of the poster, which is what he's looking for.

Notice any similarities to our current situation?

I've been reading these threads with interest the last few days. I always find it amusing when the theoretical and practical worlds collide.

I see merits to both sides of this fence. I hold a degree in Behavioural Psychology (Cum Laude, at that), and have published articles on learning and memory. I'm currently an Instructional Designer for a Fortune 300 corporation, and could (given time to 'refresh') certainly engage Kelton in the type of discussion which he is desperately seeking.

Every good dog trainer I know realizes full well that the methods they employ are certainly grounded in Behavioural Theory and learning methodology. To do otherwise would be ludicrous.

However, in dog training, the 'theory' part of it is practically useless without proveable, reproduceable results. I rely on my background, certainly, but you always learn more from being on the end of a leash for countless hours and being involved with 'those who know' than you ever will from books or videos.

When faced with a difficult situation as Molly describes in a previous post, I rely on EXPERIENCE to get me through. Trying to decide at the time whether to employ a 'variable reward schedule' or attempting to manipulate the environment so that it is more favorable can get you seriously hurt.

Bottom line....when it comes to dog training, I'll listen to someone who has 10 years of proven success before I'll take the advice of someone with 30 years of studying theory.

Scott has a degree in Behavioural Psychology ?!?

But...but....you seem so normal at the ASR trials...

>> After many attempts at questioning the evasive new poster, the best that the race car drivers can figure out is that the new posters car experience consists of driving to work.
Is the above scenario unreasonable? <<<

No. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> And I answered questions regarding that. Just check back. It was the part about titling dogs and such.
I have been hired to work with a variety of critters, but mostly people. My methods don't change (fundamentally) regardless of which species is in front of me. I am best qualified to discuss the principles behind a given procedure. I am training some form of client on each and every one of my work days pretty much all day...or at least I am typing up a treatment procedure and data collection methods.

I am far less qualified in terms of the various clever ways of going about combining these principles in achieving a particular objective particularly with regard to a competition requirement. There are dog trainers and dog training books, which describe positively brilliant and elegant procedures. I do not pretend to be a master of such things...and never have...and I am untested in this area.

Here's another analogy:
I might know many vocabulary words....many more than the average person, this does not mean though, that I can write a masterful work of literature or a funny script for a sitcom. Even though the writer is using the same words that I have used, he is just more experienced than I am at combining them in efficient and effective ways at achieving his objective. A person who trains dolphins all day and keeps up with current literature is going to have a lot to teach me no matter how well I have studied my behavioral principles.

On the other hand, I think good trainers and good dog training book recognize the value of the contributions of behavioral science as they use terms such as reinforcement, extinction, escape and so on...and any mention of BF Skinner is also a credit to the field.

***Is asking someone who posts virtual lectures in the car forum their credentials not a valid question?***

I'm looking for folks who may happen to have an interest in training procedures and the underlying behavioral principles. I'm looking for a discussion...where I say something and then the next person responds. C'mon, you know what I mean. This sort of dialogue stands to be educational for me and probably the other guy as well. Some people do like to discuss these things....I like dog training....and I like behavioral principles (in fact, it's hard to seperate the two). If you or someone else is not interested, well, I'm sure you are also not interested in many other conversations on this forum which is evidenced by the fact that you aren't active on all of them. So I've got no problem with someone who just doesn't care about this stuff.

A final analogy: saying that you don't think behavioral science is not relevant to training (and I'm not saying that you, in particular, are)is like saying that you like water, but the physiology of water absorbtion through the membranes is not relevant. It's just my opinion, but I think it's a fascinating field of study.

***us in rapt awe of the poster, which is what he's looking for.***

How do you know that this is what I want? I'd like to keep this on the topic of dogs, training, and...yes, a discussion of behavioral princples.