Relative efficacy of human social interaction and food as reinforcers for domestic dogs and hand-reared wolves.
Food beats brief petting or praise for brand-new tasks with dogs—and probably with humans too.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Researchers compared two reinforcers for dogs and hand-reared wolves.
The animals earned a nose-touch to a target. One reward was a small piece of food. The other was brief petting and praise from a person.
Each animal went through short sessions. The team counted how many nose-touches happened with each reward.
What they found
Food won every time. Dogs and wolves touched the target more often when food followed the response.
Brief social interaction worked, but it produced far fewer responses. The gap held for every animal tested.
How this fits with other research
Tassé et al. (2013) looked at the same contest in humans with ID/DD. In that study, chosen social interactions did reinforce behavior. The results seem opposite, but the key difference is choice. The 2013 team first let clients pick their favorite social activity, then used only that item. Bowen et al. (2012) gave every dog the same quick pet and praise, no choice involved.
Hodos et al. (1976) also pitted social praise against tangible rewards. Teen girls in a correctional facility worked harder when they could earn tokens plus staff praise. Again, the tangible item boosted the weaker social one. Together, the three studies show that social attention can help, but it usually needs a tangible partner to beat food.
Why it matters
When you teach a new skill, start with food. Even friendly dogs and wolves ignored praise when kibble was an option. Save petting, kind words, or high-fives for maintenance or for clients who have shown they prefer them. Pairing social praise with a small edible can stretch the power of your attention while you fade the food later.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Despite the intimate relationship dogs share with humans in Western society, we know relatively little about the variables that produce and maintain dog social behavior towards humans. One possibility is that human social interaction is itself a reinforcer for dog behavior. As an initial assessment of the variables that might maintain dog social behavior, we compared the relative efficacy of brief human social interaction to a small piece of food as a reinforcer for an arbitrary response (nose touch). We investigated this in three populations of canids: shelter dogs, owned dogs, and hand-reared wolves. Across all three canid populations, brief social interaction was a relatively ineffective reinforcer compared to food for most canids, producing lower responding and longer latencies than food.
Journal of the experimental analysis of behavior, 2012 · doi:10.1016/j.beproc.2004.01.012