Your rat is doing some problem behaviour, say for example nipping. This is super annoying, painful, and something that makes you enjoy the time with them less. You want them to stop NOW. This article will look at your options for managing a problem behaviour like this and analyse it with a detailed understanding of the principles of behaviour and how they affect our rats.
Some guidance online to stopping a problem behaviour like this is to pick the rat up and tell them a firm “no”. Rats are intelligent, but they don’t understand our verbal behaviour in the way we do. To them, that ‘no’ is just a sound, often a loud, sharp, not particularly pleasant sound that follows a behaviour they do. Now behaviourally speaking, that ‘no’ can do one of three things to the problem behaviour in the future:
- The problem behaviour continues happening at the same rate as it is happening now.
- The problem behaviour happens more frequently in the future (which is what you definitely don’t want!)
- The problem behaviour happens less frequently in the future (which is what you intended)
To me, all three of those outcomes are terrible. Here’s why:
- If the problem behaviour continues occurring, then understandably you haven’t made any difference with saying no- clearly it’s not affecting their behaviour, so you’re basically wasting your breath. In this situation, the rats are fine, but you are likely miserable because the rat is doing something you don’t like and you feel powerless to resolve it. An unhappy owner is not a good owner and those feelings will likely manifest into how you interact with the naughty rat. Not good.
- The problem behaviour happens more frequently- uh-oh! Here you have discovered that your ‘no!’ is actually reinforcing to your rat. This means that by picking them up and saying no, you are actually rewarding them for that behaviour. Even if something doesn’t seem rewarding to you, a rat may well experience it differently. It might even be that the purpose of the behaviour was to get your attention in the first place, and you have now taught them that this problem behaviour is the best way to do it. Not good for you, not good for the rat, and not good for the relationship between you both!
- The problem behaviour happens less frequently in the future- this sounds like a success, right? Not at all. IF this happens when you say no, it means that the “no” ( a stimulus that is delivered after a behaviour occurs) is aversive. This means that it’s something that is stressful/painful/uncomfortable/horrible to the rats that they want to escape. If you do this and the problem behaviour occurs less, you have actually used a punishment procedure on your rats.
Punishment procedures are much loved by humans in general (much to the chagrin of behaviourists who understand the problems of punishment and abide by strict ethical codes to use interventions that use positive reinforcement before any form of punishment). Humans love to use punishment because, when effective, it stops the behaviour right there and then in the moment. Positive reinforcement based methods, on the other hand, take much longer to take effect. Similarly, punishment feels good, particularly when the behaviour we are trying to reduce is one that we really really hate- punishing another animal for doing something that we don’t like is often reinforcing to us! (and that’s also a slippery slope to start heading down).
So this is why we love punishment- but why is that a problem? Well, the research on punishment procedures with animals (including humans) is pretty damn clear. Punishment has a number of side effects on the animal that is being punished. I have already written in detail about this here , but in short, punishment increases the aggression by rats in response to being punished, makes them more likely to lash out at their cage mates (even if it’s you doing the punishment); punishment doesn’t actually meet the needs of the rat (every behaviour is a form of communication and you’re not ‘listening’ to what they need, instead just enforcing their silence while their need goes unmet); punishment induces a biological stress response; punishment doesn’t teach what the correct behaviour is, and punishment is more likely to increase other problematic behaviours in the place of the punished behaviour (okay so you may have stopped the nipping, but now the rat pulls at your clothing or chews your socks). Finally, if all of those reasons aren’t enough to convince you not to use punishment procedures, punishment degrades the relationship between the owner and rat. This is the aspect I want to spend a bit more time on here.
In pure behavioural terms, using punishment makes the owner a discriminative stimulus for punishment. In non-behavioural terms, there’s an analogy that I think illustrates this nicely:
Imagine that the relationship and trust between you and your rat can be seen like a bank account. With most rats, you start off at £0 in the account. For every interaction you have with them that’s positive, you deposit a sum of money into the account. Some interactions, such as feeding them treats, might deposit you £10 and others such as stroking their heads might deposit £5. The values here are going to be completely individual; some rats are super food motivated and you can deposit more into the account through treats and feeding, others may be play motivated and you earn their trust that way.
Now, you can also withdraw from that account. And withdrawals are A LOT more costly than deposits. Ever accidentally step on your rat’s tail? That’s £500 gone instantly. Force feed them medication? There’s another £300 for each dose. Again, these are going to be individual to each rat but all are withdrawals and all cost more than the deposits. Here’s where our punishment procedure comes in- if the ‘no’ technique works, it’s a punisher, and just like the example punishers above, it is going to cost you a lot. The exact amount is going to vary by individual rat, but the more effective it is, the more comes out of your account. Now stepping on their tail only happens once in a blue moon, and medication is twice a day usually max. But punishment in the form of a ‘no’ (which actually produces the same biological effect as a physical punisher such as pain) is likely happening a lot more frequently than that. If you spend enough time depositing with your positive interactions, you can build up enough in your account, that even with some big withdrawals, the account is not completely depleted and the relationship can be preserved.
However, let’s talk about what’s going to happen when you get overdrawn by using punishment regularly. If you start heading towards the red i.e., more negative interactions than the positive ones can make up for, you’re changing your status from a beacon of love and affection and all things good, to a symbol of fear, pain, uncertainty, and something to be avoided. What this means is that the rat is going to start not wanting to be with you, not wanting to interact with you, and not trust you. This is going to mean that 1. Those positive interactions are going to be worth even less (a treat that was worth £5 may now only be worth £1), so it’s going to take you longer and you’re going to have to work harder to build yourself back up to where you were before in the account. It also means you may start experiencing some of those side effects e.g., the rat lashing out, in effect causing more problem behaviours than you started with. And as someone who cares for your rat, you are going to know that you are putting your rat under undue stress and negative emotion.
Are you serious? Surely saying ‘no’ isn’t THIS bad??
Actually, yes, if it works, then it is! Now, some owners may find that their account balance is so high that they can deliver some punishers and the relationship recovers easily, but I would suggest that this is an extremely small percentage of the rat owning population. Additionally, I think many keepers would actually be unlikely to accurately judge where their bank account is at and would be more likely to think their balance is higher than it actually is. Even if your account balance is in the black, the other side effects and ethical concerns with using punishment procedures are still relevant. My best advice is to ‘save’ the use of punishment for when you NEED an immediate stop to a dangerous behaviour as a one-off. You accidentally dropped a human medicine on the floor and before you can grab the tablet, the rat discovers it, nabs it, and legs it across the room and is about to nibble it. In this situation, a loud clap or sending an item sliding across the floor to startle the rat into dropping the tablet before they bite it is possibly the quickest way to get them to not ingest the substance. You forgot to put a wire out of reach and the rat is about to take a big chomp into it. You jump up suddenly and it sends the rat scattering. These are, in my opinion, an appropriate use of punishment to prevent immediate danger. It’s a one-off and the damage to the relationship is less costly than the damage that could have been done if you had not intervened.
While we’re at it, let’s quickly mention that sometimes another recommendation is to squeak if your rat bites/nips you. The idea behind this is that that’s what their siblings/other rats would do to tell them it’s too hard and that’s how they learn. That very well might be the case, but 1. You are not a rat, and the rat does not perceive you to be a rat, or your squeak to be a squeak from a rat, 2. It is still punishment if it works, as that shows the rat found it aversive. 3. Just because it’s a punisher that occurs naturally in the wild doesn’t make the effect any more damaging (or reduce the effect on your trust account balance!) It’s natural for rats to experience punishment in the form of being attacked by predators or chewing poisonous or dangerous items in the wild, but we don’t allow that either. As owners, I believe our job is to give them the best life we can free of as many unnecessary stressors as possible.
Okay, okay, you’ve convinced me. But I still need to stop this behaviour!
Absolutely you do! You don’t need to put up with problem behaviours, but you might need some help in dealing with them ethically and by using positive reinforcement only (or other antecedent interventions). Using these methods, you don’t just avoid withdrawing from the account, but are actively adding to it and reducing the problem behaviour at the same time. What’s not to like!
To begin with we need to find out the reason for the behaviour. To do this, you need to watch what happens immediately before the behaviour occurs and immediately after (a few seconds before and after). Based on what you find, there are a few different types of interventions you can try (this is not an exhaustive list, just some examples):
If you find that they are engaging in the behaviour and you always deliver attention (positive or negative attention) after the behaviour happens, it may be that the behaviour occurs to get your attention/affection/reprimands etc. If a rat is chewing the cage bars and you find the sound annoying and deliver attention in the form of shouting “stop that!” this is likely to be reinforcing to the rat. Attention isn’t always ‘nice’ attention, it could just as well be a “telling-off” that they’re looking for! All behaviour is communication, so in this scenario, the rat is telling you that they want/need more of your time and love. For some keepers, some ways to address this might be to make the cage bigger and with more enriching furniture, active set ups, puzzles etc to keep them occupied, or even better, give them lots of attention BEFORE they have to do the problem behaviour. If they’re already getting lots of attention, they no longer need to engage in the behaviour in order to get what they want from you!
You might also combine the above with teaching them a better way to get your attention; for example you might consistently give them attention when they climb onto your lap, but stop giving attention when they nip you, such as standing up and bring yourself out of their reach (if you say no, it damages the relationship, if you just continuously show them that the problem behaviour doesn’t get attention, but climbing onto you does, it will take time but they will learn this relationship and in a more ethical and stress free way).
If you find that they keep engaging in the behaviour to escape or avoid something (e.g., to stop you holding them/stroking them/ etc) then you need to start delivering that escape ahead of time e.g., only hold them for short periods of time rather than keeping hold until they feel the need to request to be put down through the problem behaviour.
Finally, if you find that there’s no reliable precursor or event that happens before or after the behaviour, it may be happening just because it feels good to the rat. With these behaviours, it’s worth thinking about whether it needs to change. If it’s something that’s just annoying but isn’t a problem e.g. bar chewing, it is easiest left unaddressed.
One of the other forms of intervention that we can use is to change the environment to prevent the behaviour. These can be simple, effective and work immediately- no waiting for it to take effect. For example, if there’s a particular place on the cage the rat tends to chew the bars, try placing a bolted item there instead, or a pumice chew. If your rat keeps nipping your toes during free range, try wearing shoes. If the rat keeps chewing furniture you don’t want them to, block the rats from accessing the furniture.
All of the methods listed above take time, consistency and effort to work. They aren’t going to change behaviour immediately; you have to wait for them to take effect and it’s a slow process. Humans tend to be very impatient and jump to punishment-based methods which ‘work’ quicker and are more satisfying (but less ethical). If you forget and accidentally reinforce that problem behaviour again even once, you are back to square one. As a rule of thumb it takes about three times as long to unlearn a behaviour as it takes to learn it, so patience is absolutely the key here. Even if it seems like its not working, keep going. However, by using reinforcement based interventions to change these behaviours, you’re actually reducing the problem behaviour AND adding to your bank account- win win!
Finally, it’s worth me noting that this article has been difficult to write because I am professionally not allowed to give out clinical advice without performing assessments on behaviour in person and with a contract in place. Normally, I would absolutely advise anyone with problem behaviour to go to a professional behaviourist… but there aren’t many rat behaviourists out there! So, this article is just some ideas on what you can do yourself at home with a very basic understanding of behaviour and meeting animal needs.
Take-aways:
- Our pet rats deserve to be treated with love and compassion and to have their needs met, not silenced.
- To do this we should use positive reinforcement based, ethical approaches to managing problem behaviours.
- These methods require understanding of behaviour and take more time and patience to work than punishment based methods, but they maintain or improve the relationship between the rat and the human and mean the rats get their needs met appropriately, rather than degrade the relationship and punish the rat for communicating their needs.
- Save the use of punishment for one-off, emergency use when there is severe threat that needs immediate intervention.
Note on language: Punishment is an extremely emotive word, and behaviourists lament the fact that we have this word because to us it describes the process of reducing future behaviour by changing the environment after a behaviour occurs. I use technical terms in this article because I am speaking about a technical subject, please bear that in mind.
Azuline Rattery 