I do like clicker training for several reasons: the click can tell a horse at the exact moment that what he just did was right, even if you are not right beside him to reward him; the horse gets a good feeling when he is trying to earn a click because dopamine is released from the brain just due to the expectation of a click; using clicker training can help you learn much better observational skills, and hence help your communication with your horse; and also the horse can tell you if he's just not getting it, so you can alter your training using no force or coercive methods to help your horse succeed. It is a different attitude to one which is prevalent. Sometimes you might find that the horse simply does not enjoy what it is you want them to do, so you may decide that rather than competing, you adjust your aspirations to hacking and schooling to a lower level at home. But wow, what a partnership, when you understand what makes your horse tick and are able to give it to him!
CLICKER SCEPTICISM
But I do find there is some resistance to clicker training from horsey people.
There are several arguments against clicker training. Some people think it teaches your horse to get nippy and misbehave around food. Well, one of the first lessons is to teach the horse how to behave politely around food. It can even be used to train a horse that bites to control his urge to bite and perform an alternative behaviour instead! And it is not bribery – bribery is when you show the horse a titbit and try to lure him to do what you want by holding the morsel just out of reach. With clicker training the horse knows that a treat will be forthcoming if he can just work out what he needs to do for the click! Of course we build in cues and break down complicated things into tiny steps so he is set up to succeed.
Another argument is that horses are not like dogs (for which clicker training has been used for many years) because they forage for food in a different way, well yes, in the wild perhaps, but even then I'm sure a horse would prefer an easy titbit rather than have to roam several miles to search for a morsel of grass. Yes, some horses are not really motivated by food, but then you find out what it is that does motivate them – the same as for dogs , who sometime prefer to chase a ball as a reward, some horses might prefer a scratch in a certain place or to play some more!
And another negative belief is that you have to go on rewarding correct behaviour ALL the time. Once the behaviour is established it rarely needs to be reinforced with the clicker. The behaviour becomes conditioned; i.e. the correct behaviour becomes second nature in response to a cue and does not need to be reinforced any more. As complicated behaviours are built up, even classical movements such as such as Spanish Walk, cues lead to behaviours which become cues in themselves, become behaviours and so on, and the click comes right at the end. It is built up piece by piece, but it is important to move on, once the horse gets it 80% of the time. I have worked with someone whose horses will still not pick up their feet for long enough for them to be picked out! Duration has never been trained in, so they have never got past that first stage, and it's worse now because the horses have learned NOT to pick up their feet properly. This is obviously a disadvantage when the farrier comes! So moving on to the next stage is VERY important.
There can be a negative side to clicker training if the horse gets frustrated or over motivated. In these cases it is important to see that it's not going right, have a break and reconsider. It may be that the steps you are trying to teach your horse are too big and need to be broken down further in order for him to achieve and get his 'click', or you may need to keep training sessions shorter, with lots of breaks for easy stuff, or away from training completely, so the horse does not become over aroused.
While it is difficult to get the timing right with clicker training, it is more difficult to correctly time the release in pressure-release training, which is negative reinforcement. In negative reinforcement the horse has to eliminate all the behaviours that are not wanted in order to find which one is right, and because it is uncomfortable when he gets it wrong, the horse may stop offering any behaviour at all, some become automatons, which may be what you want?
With clicker training the horse will offer all manner of (sometimes novel) behaviours in an attempt to find the correct answer, but because he is not corrected by coercive means his enthusiasm for training is never shut down which improves his mental attitude to training. Fortunately horses are generally very eager to please. They have no reason not to be, and this is why they were domesticated all those years ago. Clicker training makes the most of this aptitude without forcing them into submission.
It is not an easy option. There are lots of skills involved with clicker training: observation, reward delivery, body position, lead rope mechanics, timing, shaping the behaviour in small steps, knowing when to move on, and more. The result is a harmonious partnership, not only because the horse is a willing partner, but also because the process has taught you to be so much more observant about your horse. You can see when things are not quite right, and then you can act upon this new information before things really go wrong. And this is one reason why I think clicker training is growing in popularity in the horse world. We all strive for the best partnership we can have with our horses, and have started to question some techniques which even under the guise of natural methods can use force to gain results.
