SheltieChe
Forums Sage
Behavior eroding during competition highly dependent on handler's attention to details and consistency during training vs. trial. We had discussion about what one is willing to let go on agility thread recently. I hear some people can loose behavior in one weekend of trialing
I do not know about research of strenght of various training methods due to eroding during competition.
Another reason why behavior will erode is behavior drift, i.e. the close behavior to instinctive the faster it erodes.
So there is need for maintenance of behavior through its life no matter which method was used. Advantage of errorless method- it is taught in components so there is no need to rehearse entire behavior over and over again. For example teeter taught as about 15 different parts/ games. So lets say something happened during trial and brilliant teeter performance detiorated. You can identify that specific part that needs tuning up and fix it with minimum fuss. Another advantage it eliminates thousands of repetitions
as it does not rely on muscle memory but on understanding of the small part of the task. Teaching sessions are usually very short and fun and enouraging with high success and reinforcement so dog is very willing to learn and not inhibited in the learning process.Errorless method is widely used now for working with humans with various learning disabilities, such as autism, mental retardation, patients with memory loss, some psychiatric disorders when retrained to entry level based jobs.
Hopefully more and more obedience teachers will be looking into learning theories to see how to improve their training.
Last edited:
/ says that one can teach earth worm and Harvard Graduate exactly same way- behavioral principles of learning theory are the same for humans and animals... but that is not why I am bringing up this thread