The advanced professional approach to animal training know as "Marker Training" is based on application of the principles of Operant Conditioning.
Operant Conditioning has been defined as both the science of explaining behavior and the powerful technology of changing it.
The principles of Operant Conditioning describe how animals learn. When trainers use Operant Conditioning, they apply the principles to obtain the results they want.
Operant Conditioning breaks learning into three parts:
- The stimulus that elicits behavior
- The actual behavior the animal does
- The consequence that occurs as a result of the behavior
According to this theoretical framework, the consequence of a behavior determines whether it will be repeated or not in the future. If the consequence strengthens a behavior — causes it to occur more frequently — we say the behavior has been reinforced. In training with markers, we use positive reinforcement to teach new skills. On the other hand, behavior that leads to unpleasant consequences occurs less frequently. Correction suppresses unwanted behaviors.
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