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Off the Beaten Path

Backward Shaping in Spiking and Blocking

By Alan Roaf on 01/01/2005

1. Backward shaping is a teaching procedure whereby the last step in a learning sequence is taught first and mastered. Then the next to last step is taught, mastered, and then built onto the final step. The process is systematically added on back to the initial stage of the sequence. The desired sequence is taught in reverse.

2. This does not teach someone to perform the movement backwards. The procedure starts with the end point action and merely develops or shapes the movement from that stage. Everything is focused on building into the final point. Gradually the form of the entire action takes place.

3. The probability of learning interference from previously mastered skill is eliminated.

Clicker Dogs Sniff the Diagnosis

By Karen Pryor on 11/01/2004

Recently, a fascinating research study made headlines internationally. In the September 2004 issue of the British Medical Journal, British researchers reported using trained dogs to detect bladder cancer by sniffing human urine, opening up the possibility that dogs may one day be used to detect the disease.

What the media did not report is that the dogs in this research project were clicker trained. We have also heard directly from a researcher at a West Coast university, where a similar project is underway—in which they are also clicker training the dogs.

The Coming Revolution in Youth Sport Coaching

By Aaron B. Clayton on 07/01/2004

The coaching of kids is due for a revolution. Cultural and economic forces are driving youth sports toward increasingly competitive training and commitment at earlier ages. The result is stressed-out kids, parents, and coaches, high levels of burnout, lowered levels of long-term athletic participation, and missed development opportunities.

The solution lies is in changing the way we teach athletics. Youth coaching today is still rooted in traditional theories for shaping behavior, which results in two limited approaches: coach kids to perform their best, or coach kids to encourage continued participation, i.e., to have fun. There is, however, a new approach to shaping behavior that offers a new paradigm: peak performance while having fun.

Clicking for Oil: The Tale of the Fuel Storage Tank Inspector

By KPCT on 07/01/2004

How Bob the UST [Underground Storage Tank] Inspector had to choose what was more important: compliance or enforcement

Clicker Trained Rats Make Headlines

By Gale Pryor on 05/01/2004

On May 18, readers of the New York Times were treated to a front-page story on mine-sniffing Gambian giant pouched rats. The reporter, Michael Wines, traveled to Mozambique to discover the latest breakthrough in mine detection technology: a squad of rats, outfitted in tiny harnesses and hitched to 10-yard clotheslines. When the rats catch the scent of TNT, the give-away for a buried landmine, they deliberately scratch the earth.