Part 2: Stimulus control and cues

Join Dr. Jesús Rosales-Ruiz and Mary Hunter for two intensive days of lectures and hands-on exercises using PORTL. PORTL, or the Portable Operant Research and Teaching Lab, is a tabletop game that will help you learn more about animal behavior and learning.

In this advanced workshop, we will dive deep into a variety of topics related to stimulus control and cues. Through a series of lectures and PORTL exercises, you will learn about discrimination and generalization, different ways to add and change cues, the stimulus control quadrant, criterion and non-criterion related cues, how to test cues, how the environment and the learner’s history influence what cues are learned, poisoned cues, and much more.

Please note: This workshop is limited to attendees who also register for our Part 1: Shaping workshop on August 4-6.

The workshop will be limited to a small group of attendees to allow ample time for discussion and questions and so that participants can receive individual coaching during the exercises.

Monday - 9:30 - 5:00

Monday morning

Lecture: Stimulus control and adding cues

PORTL exercises: Cue delivery, adding cues

Monday afternoon

Lecture: Criterion and non-criterion cues

Lecture: Cues evolve during training

PORTL exercises: Teaching different types of cues

Tuesday - 9:30 - 5:00

Tuesday morning:

Lecture: The stimulus control quadrant

Lecture: Cues and context

PORTL exercises: More stimulus control exercises

Tuesday afternoon:

Lecture: Poisoned cues

PORTL exercises: Putting it all together: Advanced challenges