To Capture Or To Shape; Set Criteria When Shaping - Petsafe Clik-R CL-KR-18 Manual Del Usuario

To Capture or to Shape?

If your dog already does a cute behaviour you would like to practice so you
can get him to perform "on cue," you are "capturing" the behaviour. Put your
dog in a situation where he is likely to perform the behaviour. Then click at the
moment the behaviour happens to "mark" that behaviour. As always, follow the
click with a treat. Because behaviour that gets rewarded gets repeated, your
dog is likely to offer that behaviour again.
Once you can get the behaviour reliably, start to add a word or hand cue just
before the behaviour is likely to happen.
Before long, that cue will indicate to your dog that you are willing to "pay" for
the behaviour. Practicing the cue and behaviour followed by the click and treat
will solidify the behaviour.
If you want to instill a new behaviour in your dog, you may need to "shape"
the behaviour if your dog is not already offering it. When "shaping" a
behaviour, you will reward your dog for increasingly better attempts (also
called "successive approximations") of the desired behaviour. Choose small
or preliminary steps toward your end goal, then little by little, reward better
and better attempts. Your dog should learn quickly if you repeat a few sessions
each day.
One example of shaping behaviour would be to invite your dog to lie on a mat.
At first, you could click/treat when your dog looks at the mat, then steps on it,
then sits on it, then lies down.

Set Criteria When Shaping

When shaping new behaviours you will need to set criteria for each of the small
steps on the way to the final behaviour you will reward. Don't be intimidated!
You make these kinds of choices every day as you drive, cook dinner or multi-
task at your desk. You want to move through the process at a good pace so
don't worry about perfecting each step along the way. Each step is a temporary
criterion and if your dog is getting it right seven or eight times out of ten, move
on to the next step. You don't want your dog to get stuck performing the
intermediate steps because they have been rewarded so highly for doing so.
You also don't want to move too fast. If you up your criteria and your dog
gets too frustrated or loses interest, back up a step. Sometimes a dog will leap
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