Interesting dog study -- effectiveness praise vs. food rewards

[Bob Pr.]

Unfortunately, it didn't test for using both.

Good Boy! Do Dogs Prefer Food or Praise?

When your dog Bella does her series of three tricks--rolls over, shakes and speaks--in perfect succession, would she rather have a doggie treat or praise from you? Given the choice, many dogs actually prefer praise over food, according to researchers from Emory University in Atlanta.
Why is the bond between human and canine so strong? It may be due to THIS.
Dogs were at the center of the most famous experiments of classical conditioning, conducted by Ivan Pavlov in the early 1900s. Pavlov showed that if dogs are trained to associate a particular stimulus with food, the animals salivate in the mere presence of the stimulus, in anticipation of the food.
"One theory about dogs is that they are primarily Pavlovian machines: They just want food and their owners are simply the means to get it," said lead study author and neuroscientist Gregory Berns. "Another, more current, view of their behavior is that dogs value human contact in and of itself."
The study: The researchers wanted to better understand the basis of the dog-human bond. Is it mainly about food? Or is it about the relationship? Thirteen dogs completed the study. All were trained to voluntarily enter a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanner and remain motionless during scanning without restraint or sedation.
The dogs were trained to associate three different objects with different outcomes:

• A pink toy truck signaled a food reward
• A blue toy knight signaled verbal praise from the owner
• A hairbrush signaled no reward, which served as a control

The dogs then were tested on the three objects while in an fMRI machine. Each dog underwent 32 trials for each of the three objects as their neural activity was recorded.
The dogs also participated in a behavioral experiment. Each dog was familiarized with a room that contained a simple Y-shaped maze constructed from baby gates. One path of the maze led to a bowl of food and the other path to the dog's owner. The owners sat with their backs toward their dogs. The dog was then repeatedly released into the room and allowed to choose one of the paths. If they came to the owner, the owner praised them.
The results: Of the 13 dogs that completed the study most preferred praise from their owners over food, or they appeared to like both equally. Only two of the dogs were real chowhounds, showing a strong preference for the food.
"Dogs are hypersocial with humans," Berns says, "and their integration into human ecology makes dogs a unique model for studying cross-species social bonding." The study findings were published in the journal Social, Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience.

[windycanyon]

Honestly, I think it depends on the dog. Some are food motivated, others (better imo) are praise motivated.

[Meeps83]

I agree. You have to figure out what motivates your dog and use that as a reward.

[Abulafia]

In spite of her size (83 lbs), Hoku is totally praise oriented.

[Annette47]

My dogs say “Can I have both?” All three of the girls I have now really love praise, but they are Labradors, after all, so food is very motivating.

In Chloe’s case, a bumper toss is the most motivating thing of all - better than both food OR praise.

[ZoeysMommy]

My 2 labs will do anything for food but Zoey in particular, will do anything for food, praise and toys. Aimee is a very different lab, toys and praise only go so far, maybe its her age, shes only 11 months and has the attention span of an ant. My corgi is food driven, praise does nothing for her, a toy might work for a few moments but like Aimee, she has zero attention span even at the age of 7.

Last but not least is my chihuahua, she will do anything for a few kisses and praise, she has to be the sweetest dog that ever lived

[doubledip1]

Luna's a food girl, Comet's just happy if you make eye contact and nod.

[Tanya]

Not sure how well that particular study can be extrapolated to say though. Just shows that in that environment, those dogs chose to go to their owner. I can totally see Penny coming to me over the food (especially if it wasn't super crazy high valu but even then). just based on the environment - even with some time to get used to it and multiple visits (unles we're there very often over a few weeks). But in actual training this wouldn't be what they find motivating.

I think depending how much time is spent there before the test Rocky would pick me to at least at first.

Honestly, I think it depends on the dog. Some are food motivated, others (better imo) are praise motivated.

Yep and there is also toy/play motivation (more common in sport dogs) but many dogs find that much more rewarding that food/praise.

Rocky is all about food. NOTHING comes close to food as far as valu.

Penny would vary based on activity, environment and mood. When playing fetch nothing was as high valu as getting that ball. no food nothing. She'd spit it out or totally ignore any food i gave her. She could often be highly motivated by tug rewards as well when she was in a tugging mood. And again, if she was, food wasn't gonna cut it (and no praise either). But for training without those or high distractors, food worked well.

[TuMicks]

This was a masterpiece of research... to be able to scan brain activity in a non-sedated animal. (How many graduate students and post-docs did it take to do all that training!!!?)

In addition to praise (which my dog, naturally loves) and food (duh! She's a lab!) her strongest motivator is retrieving... in this order from least to strongest: 1. Anything made of plastic or rubber or a tennis ball. 2. A long-dead, semi-frozen bird. 3. A shot pigeon flier and 4. A shot duck flier. When her obedience slips due to excitement over guns and birds... I wish I could use an alternative motivator to get her into a perfect heel/sit position. But all the kibbles or praise in the world will not induce her to obey. That is our challenge right now.