Shaping Up Nicely

Over-all goal for Shaping: Gradually reward Ruby for acts that will eventually lead her to receive reinforcement on her own by pressing a bar that distributes the chocolate pellet (reinforcer).

Goal for Shaping Days 4-7: To successfully reinforce Ruby every time she is near the bar then raising  the criteria the more she associates the bar with reinforcement.

Procedure :  I will begin by rewarding Ruby every time she consumes the reinforcement then looks to the left (where the bar is located) . I will then raise the criteria to where Ruby will receive a reinforcement when rearing up anywhere in the front half of the box.  Following, I will reinforce Ruby anytime she rears up over the bar (even if she doesn't touch it). Finally, I'll reinforce Ruby only when she touches the bar. Hopefully, she is able to press the bar on her own to receive reinforcement.

Shaping Day 4 and 5

Fortunately for me, Ruby is pressing the bar about the same as the other rats. It is encouraging to me that Ruby is preforming at the same level as the others, simply because I thought we were behind because magazine training took so long. Ruby has continued to improve each day and I am very encouraged by that. By the end of day 5 Ruby was not longer pressing the bar by jumping up on her hind legs. Instead she was pressing the bar with her paws.

Shaping Day 5

Shaping Day 6 and 7

Ruby is finally at the point where I can just watch her press the bar and not have to manually reinforce her. As soon as I put her in the operant box she runs straight to the food magazine then once she discovers there isn't any food she begins pressing the bar. Her typical bar pressing behavior involves pressing the bar and then retrieving one pellet at a time, but occasionally she will press the bar multiple times then retrieve the pellets she's accumulated. I plan on transferring her to a fixed ratio 2 schedule of reinforcement tomorrow.

Shaping Day 7

Results/Discussion

Overall, the shaping process has been a very good experience. Ruby did much better learning to press the bar than I thought she would based on her magazine training. It took 7 days for me to feel comfortable moving on to an FR 2, but Ruby eventually achieved the shaping goal (to press the bar in order to receive reinforcement). The shaping process with Ruby was closer to the class/book discussion of shaping than was the books description of magazine training. Ruby's training took a little longer than the book's description, but overall it was a successful experience!