Reinforcement history

The accumulated record of what behaviours an individual animal has been reinforced for, what they have been punished for, and what associations they have formed.

Reinforcement history is the single most useful concept for understanding why a particular animal behaves the way they do in a particular context. Two animals of the same species, age, and breed can behave very differently because their reinforcement histories differ. A horse who has been reinforced extensively for moving forward from light leg pressure will respond to leg pressure differently than a horse whose reinforcement history involved escalating pressure with inconsistent release. A dog who has been reinforced for sit responses across many contexts will respond to “sit” differently than a dog whose only sit reinforcement happened in the kitchen at home.

A new handler taking on an established animal is inheriting that animal’s entire reinforcement history. The animal arrives with established associations, established responses, established patterns of what they expect to follow particular cues and contexts. Working effectively with an established animal involves reading what their reinforcement history has built, rather than starting from scratch as if the animal were untrained.

The concept matters particularly for diagnosing problem behaviours. Most behavioural problems with established animals reflect the animal responding accurately to the reinforcement contingencies they have learned. The “naughty” horse may simply have been reinforced for behaviours their current handler does not want. The “stubborn” dog may have been reinforced through inconsistent handling for exactly the behaviour the current handler is trying to extinguish.

The implication for training is that resetting an established animal often requires more than introducing new cues or new reinforcers. It typically requires modifying the existing reinforcement history through deliberate counterconditioning, deliberate differential reinforcement of new responses, and consistent handling that allows new patterns to form.

The concept connects to several others in this glossary. Cue dilution is what happens when reinforcement history becomes inconsistent and previously reliable cues lose their meaning. Conditioned emotional responses are particularly durable parts of reinforcement history that can be hard to modify. Variable reinforcement produces reinforcement histories that are particularly resistant to change.