Once a dog learns...

Pleasing her master!

My dog is highly food driven, but also every bit as driven to please me. I think all the techniques and lures, like food, are just means to focus my ability to communicate what I want her to do. Once she "gets" what I'm wanting, she's happy to provide it, treats or no.

Force of habit and/or a variable reinforcement schedule.

praise, wanting to please their family and natural pack mentality

Interesting... So one, it could still be a possibility of repeated rewards, such as treats, a game of tug, etc. Two, it could be that the dog has learned that when it does X, it makes you happy, and 'happy' is good for the relationship - i.e. happy pack.
Go on... []

ORIGINAL: houndlove

Force of habit and/or a variable reinforcement schedule.

Do you think it's possible for a dog to expect rewards years after years you have stopped using them?

So if praise works then why not to do only that from the beginning?

Praise is usually a predictor of good things coming to the dog (or bad things not coming) which is why dogs respond to it. In and of itself I can't see how it would be reinforcing. But follow up verbal praise enough times with something tangible--a treat, a priviledge, a massage, and the praise comes to mean good things for the dog. If you were to praise the dog and then immediately smack it upside the head every time, you'd wind up with a dog who did not enjoy praise. Even people who refuse to use tangible rewards can wind up with a dog who seems to enjoy praise, as recieiving praise becomes a predictor for a period of time in which the dog is not going to get corrected or punished. Your praise becomes a conditioned reinforcer, either in the context of positive reinforcement (predicts delivery of good things) or negative reinforcement (predicts an absence of bad things).

And that's why it usually doesn't work to just start with praise-only right off the bat and expect that to be reinforcing for the dog. A dog like Marlowe, who'd never been a pet before, had no idea what praise was all about when I first brought him home. I had to demonstrate to him that my praise behaviors were a predictor of happy, harmonious, good time fun. Now when I say his name in a squeaky voice, he wags his tail. He used to just look at me like I was a total weirdo.

Totally agree with Houndlove.

Okay houndlove has a good point!

So, do you think it's possible for a dog to expect tangible rewards after you've stopped using them? [8|] That is, if you believe a dog is still motivated by them years and years after it has learned a command?

No, but definately petting and praise, for a job well done, but in the begining, rewards are important for the dog to have it stuck in its head.  After, praise and the occasional treat, is great!

I use treats for a brief period to teach some commands, and then discontinue them once the dog understands the command. Once the dog understands the command, the relationship and working together is the reward. I don't use excitement in my voice to praise if I want my dog to remain calm. Low vocal tones, a scratch, or a pat works well.
 
With trick training and having fun, I don't discontinue treats because I want the dog's drive, anticipation, and excitement level up a bit. I use a voice marker rather than a clicker with trick training because I don't like the over-the-top addictive level clickers bring into the relationship and don't want to simply be viewed as a codependant to a clicker-and-treat junkie. But that's just me. []
 
Out in the real world and away from home, no treats are used unless I am dealing with a fearful dog and then I use them in an associative sense (classical conditioning). I see a value here in the use of treats.
 
My primary choice of reward and motivation for my dog, is the relationship.

So, do you think it's possible for a dog to expect tangible rewards after you've stopped using them? That is, if you believe a dog is still motivated by them years and years after it has learned a command?

Yes... in a way.

When my dog was a puppy, I gave him a high-value treat whenever he went to the bathroom outside. He rarely if ever gets treats now. I can't remember the last time I gave him a treat.

But he still poops and pees the minute he gets outside, even though it is in his best interest to dawdle.

I don't have a window onto my dog's brain, but I am guessing that I made a sufficiently strong association:

Eliminate and something really good happens

And every once in a great while I will offer something like praise or a treat if it is handy and this keeps the "jackpot effect" strong, I am guessing.

I don't think that my dog poops quickly because he loves me or wants to please me or cares about our relationship. I care about these things, and I do think my dog loves me, but I don't think he connects pooping to love.

These things are mysterious, and I am not a woman of mystery.

I think he does it because it feels good, and I am pretty sure it feels good because I gave him a lot of liver for a few months.

I think he does it because it feels good, and I am pretty sure it feels good because I gave him a lot of liver for a few months.

 
I agree with this. We haven't given a treat for going to the bathroom outside in many years, but none have regressed without the treat. According to Patricia McConnell, the reward can rewire the association in the brain to create a pleasurable feeling that is permanent.