Aversive Conditioning

Word Count: 950

Aversive conditioning is a manufactured negative response to
certain things, much like the operant conditioning developed by
Skinner. The contingent behavior is behavior that, when
performed, results in the delivery of specific consequences or
reinforcers. This article described the measures taken to make
coyotes stop wanting to kill lambs for food. The authors’
contention is that it may be possible to reconcile the desires of
both ranchers and conservationists. The latter group wishes to
enable the coyote and, perhaps other predators, to survive in the
open range, as they have for millions of years. Species that kill farm
animals include others: mountain lions, bears, bobcats, and red
wolves as well as coyotes. This paper on aversive conditioning
mainly addresses whether behavior of coyotes can be altered
without affecting their survival in the wild. The question Mssrs.
Gustavson and Garcia attempt to address is whether coyotes can
be conditioned to kill animals such as mice, rabbits, gophers, and
squirrels- species of no economic value in the western United
States- while leaving sheep alone. Clearly, sheep have tremendous
economic value in terms of meat and wool production, and
ranchers as well as the general meat-consuming public have a
vested interest in the survival and success of the ranching
industry. Just as clearly, environmentalist and conservationists
have an interest in seeing that certain species are enabled to
survive in their native habitat, and not simply confined in zoos
under whatever terms humans dictate.

To see if they could make coyotes stop killing lambs, the authors
first took a sample population of coyotes from different regions of
Montana where coyotes were notorious for killing shepherds’
flocks. They captured seven coyotes, five from the wild and two
from captivity. Presumably all of them loved to eat lamb meat. They
fed them tainted lamb, wrapped in fresh lamb hide. The meat itself
was not toxic to the long-term health of the coyotes that devoured
it. Instead, it was laced with lithium chloride, which causes
vomiting. One assumption made was that the lithium did not
actually affect the taste of the meat. Therefore, the coyotes
actually did consume the meat, and uniformly became sick after
eating the lamb. As a result of associating the meat with vomiting
the coyotes didn’t want to eat lamb anymore. On the contrary, they
ran away and hid from the lambs after having eaten the bad lamb
meat. Only weeks afterward did they begin to approach lambs as
prey when given the chance, and they didn’t devour their food as
they usually did. They tested their food one bite at a time, waiting
between bites to see if they got sick.

In fact, during an earlier experiment with hamburger tainted with
lithium the coyotes all became ill. After the coyotes associated the
hamburger with emesis, they didn’t even taste hamburger offered
to them. Instead, the coyotes urinated on the meat, turned over
their meat dish, or actually buried it. The experiment with
lithium-laced lamb was a temporarily successful one in that theThis is ONLY a preview of the article. If you would like to view the entire document, you must subscribe to Electronic References. Please register below now!

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