Pavlov’s dogs

Posted March 26th, 2009 by candi

Years ago at uni, I learnt about Pavlov’s dogs, negative reinforcement, punishments and rewards, etc. My boys certainly illustrate those concepts well. Awhile ago I noticed that they associate the click of the laptop cover with me getting up and going to the kitchen. Of course, they associated the kitchen with food – intermittent reinforcement is the most effective – so they dance around all over the place.

This can be annoying if the children are asleep, because I am afraid they will wake them up. They aren’t large dogs, but the thudding and clattering of their paw is loud enough to make me cross.

The other day I had an epiphany. My boys are turning 12 this year – that’s what, 84 in human years. I am lucky to have them around still!

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 26th, 2009 at 9:12 pm and is filed under Gratitude. You can follow responses to this entry through the Comments RSS Feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your site.

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