Part, III: Increasing odor detection performance after training with progressively leaner schedules of odor prevalence

Abstract

Prior work has demonstrated canine search behavior and performance declines when challenged with infrequent target odors. The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether performance could be maintained in a low target odor prevalence context by explicitly training dogs through progressively leaner target odor schedules. In Experiment 1, nine control dogs were trained at 90% target prevalence rate. Nine experimental dogs were trained with progressively lower prevalence rates in 10% increments until reaching 20% prevalence with > 85% detection accuracy in the training context. Both groups were tested in the operational context at a 10% target odor prevalence. Experimental dogs had higher accuracy, hit percentage, and shorter search latency in the operational context compared with control dogs. In Experiment 2, twenty-three operational dogs were challenged with a target frequency of 10%, which resulted in 67% accuracy. Control dogs were then trained with 90% target frequency, whereas experimental dogs received a progressively decreasing target rate from 90% to 20%. The dogs were rechallenged with target frequencies of 10, 5, and 0%. Experimental dogs outperformed control dogs (93% vs. 82% accuracy) highlighting the effect of explicit training for infrequent targets.

Calibrating canines—a universal detector calibrant for detection dogs

“…In many cases, there are restrictions to placing live target materials (e.g., explosives) in operational environments for various safety concerns, which exacerbates this decline in canine search behavior and performance (i.e., 47 , 48 ). Although training methods can help build the duration of search behavior in the absence of targets (i.e., 49 , 50 ), being able to provide targets that can be placed in operational environments can be very helpful to maintain search performance.…”