Feed the Spook

Always feed the spook! Feeding the spook, shrinks the spook. This seems counter intuitive, we know that we get more of what we reinforce, so why should we reinforce "bad" behavior like spooking?

Remember my last few graphics, respondent vs operant behaviors, classical vs operant conditioning, counter conditioning, stimulus stacks... this all adds up to explain exactly why we want to feed the spook.

Spooking is a respondent, reflexive, involuntary reaction to a stimulus triggered by high level emotions. We aren't going to operantly change a respondent behavior. We need to CLASSICALLY change the emotional response to the trigger. By pairing the trigger with good things we change the emotions that trigger elicits, and with it, the behavior will change too.

We don't want to just feed, but also redirect to small, simple behaviors that have a high rate of reinforcement, to help soothe the horse and help those fear hormones settle back down to baseline. So this initial trigger doesn't become as big of a part of a stimulus stack, resulting in a bigger spook. So feed the spook, then work on something easy until the horse has swung back to being truly comfortable and relaxed.

You can't reinforce fear with R+, you are only providing comfort. Also, what behavior do we want our horse to do when they are scared? We want them to check in with us, allow us to reassure them and help them calm. So, like any good mother, when our child is upset, we comfort them by filling their belly... ok maybe that's just my Italian family