To Treat or not to Treat?

Dog training is a real minefield sometimes. Rewarding our dog when they do something we’ve asked them to do really varies owner to owner. Some owners will swear that they don’t need treats in order to train their dog, and others will give them a tasty little treat every single time they come bounding back across the field to you when you call their name. Other owners might use treats to teach their dog a new trick, but then remove them once the behaviour has been learned. So what is the right thing to do? Do you give your dog a tasty reward every time they perform? Or give none at all once they’ve learned the trick? The answer? Neither. Let me explain.

Let’s start by introducing three new types of reward system. In the first, the dog is given a treat every time they carry out the behaviour or task that’s been asked of them, this is called a fixed reward schedule. In the second, a dog is never given a treat for doing the behaviour or task, lets just call this a no reward schedule (or as your dog would probably refer to this, a rubbish reward schedule). In the third, the dog is sometimes given treats for completing the task, and sometimes not, in a seemingly unpredictable pattern. This is known as a variable reward schedule. The third is the one you want to use and the third is the one your dog will likely respond better to. Using a variable reward system, your dog is likely to perform the behaviour more consistently and with more enthusiasm. Why does this work?

It seems counter-intuitive at first that giving your dog less of a reward would actually improve their behaviour. And it isn’t that they see the lack of reward as some kind of punishment and therefore try harder or anything like that. It’s because, at least in part, a variable reward system is actually just more fun for the dog. So treats sometimes is more fun than treats every time? It still doesn’t sound right does it? Lets think about how humans behave for a second.

Every day you go to work, you come home, you go back. You know what hours you’re going to work and you know at the end of the month you’re going to get paid. Every month you get paid, it’s usually around the same amount. That’s great isn’t it? You get the security of knowing that you’ll be paid for your hard work and in turn you can pay the bills and so on and so on. There’s just one problem, it isn’t very fun, is it? Now think about this instead. You go into a room full of shiny flashy machines and sit down at one of them. You put £1 into it and press the button. an assortment of fruits, gold bars and money symbols spin around before 3 cherries all line up. The machine goes wild, flashing and blaring and out of the bottom of it drops £5. This is brilliant, you think. You put another £1 coin into the slot and roll again, except this time, none of the symbols match up and the machine pockets your £1 coin. You feel a bit disheartened, but remembering your previous £5 win, you decide to have another go and deposit another £1 into the machine. No luck, it eats it up again. Another, but this time the fruits line up and out spits another £2. You’re having lots of fun now, you’re not winning every time but the anticipation and excitement you feel each time you drop another £1 in is building, becoming addictive.

Now we all know that this ends with you having no money at the end of the night. We also know this isn’t the exact the same for dogs as they aren’t exactly betting anything and they aren’t going to be going home skint since their whole existence is paid for by us. But the underlying mechanisms at play are very similar and this is why gambling is a very serious addiction. The anticipation of whether they will get the reward is fun for our canine companions. This turns the task almost into a game and dogs are much more likely to engage in something if they find it fun. Sometimes the thought of the reward might be enough to get your dog to come running over to you. But when they know that they’re going to get it each and every time, it really does take the fun out of it a little and they might just be a little more tempted to go investigate the rustling in the bushes instead. Adding in a variable reward schedule adds just that little bit of extra excitement for your dog and it’s almost unanimously agreed by experts that a variable reward schedule results in better performance from our dogs.

Another reason a fixed reward schedule can be less effective is due to associations. Dogs learn by association. They sit, they get a treat, they sit, they get a treat. They associate sitting, with a reward and therefore, do it for us. With a fixed reward schedule where you reward every time, the association it builds will be very strong, but may also be more fragile. When a learned behaviour stops occurring, we call this behaviour extinction. When on a fixed reward schedule, a dog is more likely to unlearn the behaviour in the absence of reward as by not providing the reward, we are disrupting the association which can then lead to behaviour extinction. However, on a variable reward schedule, as the dog is not expecting the reward every time, it does not discourage him from doing the behaviour in the future just because he did not get a reward this time. So, if you want your dog to keep a certain learned behaviour, a variable reward schedule is the way to go. However, a fixed reward schedule does have it’s place in training.

In order to teach a dog a new behaviour in the first place, a fixed reward schedule is necessary. This goes back to learning by association. When dogs are learning a new task, they are trying to learn what they need to do in order to get the tasty reward. In this instance, the reward needs to be given consistently each time the dog displays the behaviour you are trying to train. This enables them to build that association and understand exactly what it is you are asking them. Using a variable reward schedule to teach a dog a new behaviour is just going to result in the dog becoming confused at what exactly he needs to do in order to get the treat. However, once the association has been learned and the dog understands reliably what you are asking of him, then it’s time to move onto a variable reward schedule to keep it going. Remember, a variable reward schedule needs to be unpredictable, like a slot machine. So simply switching to giving your dog a treat every other time he completes the task doesn’t count as the dog will learn this pattern. They are very clever.

One last note to owners that claim they don’t use treats at all once a behaviour has been learned. There’s always exceptions to the rule and I’m sure there are cases where a dog will continue to carry out the desired behaviour on command without treats. Some dogs with particularly obedient temperaments or those that love to people please may still do this. But this is the exception to the rule. Furthermore, even if your dog will perform without a treat, give him one anyway. We bring dogs into our homes and ask things of them that do not come naturally to them, in order to please us and make our lives easier, they deserve a treat for that, even if they’ll do it without.