My brother Michael trained his dog to scratch at the balcony door if he needed to go out for a wee. After a week or so the system worked fairly well. The dog would scratch the door, Michael would open the door, the dog would go out for a wee.
The dog learned that scratching the door got Michael to open it. So far so good.
Weeks later, the dog scratched at the balcony door. Michael duly got out of his beanbag to open it. The dog ignored the open door, and dashed over to sit in Michael’s warm spot in the recently vacated bean bag. Didn’t even need a wee.
As a result, the system broke down, and the dog often wees on the floor now.
Incentivising people is tricky. Often we inadvertently encourage and reward the wrong behaviour.
This story doesn’t feature in this episode, because I only just remembered it. But Col has strong feelings about who should bear the cost of disposing of rubbish.
