Luring, Targeting, and Shaping - What Are They?
Luring, Target, and Shaping are the 3 main methods of training rats (or any other animal):
Luring is a training method in which you use food to lead your rat into doing certain behaviors. Its perfect for training tricks like spin and paw, and can help you train just about anything if you use it correctly. The main downside with luring is that if you don't know how to fade out a lure quickly, you can easily get stuck on one step. That being said, I find that an experienced trainer can usually fade out a lure almost immediately - this is why I'm able to train a new rat to spin on hand cues in under a minute!
Targeting is a training method in which you use a target to lead your rat into performing different behaviors. A target is simply an object that you can conditioned the rat to associate touching with a treat. This is a great method for training rats that are too food motivated to concentrate when you try luring. There are two pain types of targeting: paw targets and nose targets. Each is exactly what it sounds, with a paw target requiring the rat to place their paw on it and a nose target requiring them to touch their nose to it. The main downside of targeting is that it can be difficult to juggle a target stick along with other tools when training. The easiest way to get around this is to simply use your hand as the target - something which many rats take to following pretty quickly!
Shaping is a training method in which you reward the rat for any approximations they make towards your desired behavior, then begin to narrow down the behaviors you reward for until your rat is doing the final behavior. Shaping can be difficult for new trainers because it requires the use of a clicker - an object that makes a consistent noise every time you hit it and which the rat has been conditioned to find rewarding ("click = treat"). Each time you click the clicker, the rat will realize that they've done something you liked, and an experienced clicker-trained at will immediately repeat variations of that behavior to try and find exactly what your looking for. The main downside to click-training is that if your not clicking at the exact moment the rat does your desired behavior, then you'll just confuse them. Practice makes perfect though so the more you work with it, the better you'll become!
To the left is a video demonstrating the differences between luring a trick and shaping it (targeting is basically just luring without the food, so you can imagine training a trick with a target is very similar to using a lure to train that trick):
Luring is a training method in which you use food to lead your rat into doing certain behaviors. Its perfect for training tricks like spin and paw, and can help you train just about anything if you use it correctly. The main downside with luring is that if you don't know how to fade out a lure quickly, you can easily get stuck on one step. That being said, I find that an experienced trainer can usually fade out a lure almost immediately - this is why I'm able to train a new rat to spin on hand cues in under a minute!
Targeting is a training method in which you use a target to lead your rat into performing different behaviors. A target is simply an object that you can conditioned the rat to associate touching with a treat. This is a great method for training rats that are too food motivated to concentrate when you try luring. There are two pain types of targeting: paw targets and nose targets. Each is exactly what it sounds, with a paw target requiring the rat to place their paw on it and a nose target requiring them to touch their nose to it. The main downside of targeting is that it can be difficult to juggle a target stick along with other tools when training. The easiest way to get around this is to simply use your hand as the target - something which many rats take to following pretty quickly!
Shaping is a training method in which you reward the rat for any approximations they make towards your desired behavior, then begin to narrow down the behaviors you reward for until your rat is doing the final behavior. Shaping can be difficult for new trainers because it requires the use of a clicker - an object that makes a consistent noise every time you hit it and which the rat has been conditioned to find rewarding ("click = treat"). Each time you click the clicker, the rat will realize that they've done something you liked, and an experienced clicker-trained at will immediately repeat variations of that behavior to try and find exactly what your looking for. The main downside to click-training is that if your not clicking at the exact moment the rat does your desired behavior, then you'll just confuse them. Practice makes perfect though so the more you work with it, the better you'll become!
To the left is a video demonstrating the differences between luring a trick and shaping it (targeting is basically just luring without the food, so you can imagine training a trick with a target is very similar to using a lure to train that trick):
Watch this video to learn about luring, targeting, and shaping! |
Watch this video to see luring and shaping in action! |
Disclosure: Esther (and her site rattrix.weebly.com) is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com