Training

Do you want to teach your puppy to have the kind of attention on a leash that the puppy in the picture below has? Notice the vehicle coming up from behind the puppy. This is a major highway with traffic going 55 mph. Cars are flying by and 11 week old Jax is focused on his handler. Read on to learn the“whys” and the “how to‘s” of teaching a puppy to walk on a leash. Leash walking a puppy without his pulling on the leash is possible!

This page was written primarily for families with a new puppy. However, the training process described in this article can be applied to any age dog.

Train and Socialize First

The best way to train a puppy to consistently walk well on a leash without pulling is to lay a good foundation before heading out on a real walk. We teach loose leash walking by way of a 3-step process. The first step involves at home training: in your house or in your backyard. The second step is to take this same training into increasingly distracting environments. And then the final step is to actually walk in one of these environments that you have already desensitized and socialized your puppy to.

The Purpose of the Leash Walk in Young Puppies

The primary purpose of a leash walk for a new unsocialized puppy should be two-fold. First, you need to provide the puppy with socialization experiences and chances to acclimate to new environments or to new sights, sounds, and smells. A second purpose for a leash walk for a new puppy is training.

Leash Walking and Exercise

A leash walk for a new puppy should not be for the purpose of getting exercise. Exercise should not be a part of a leash walking experience until a puppy has developed a level of self-control, been thoroughly desensitized to a particular environment, and been well trained in loose leash walking in that particular environment. See our page on Exercise and the Young Puppy for ideas on how to meet this very important need in your puppy.

Further, for large breed puppies, leash walking is not enough exercise. Large breed puppies need opportunities to run and play. These opportunities need to be off-leash. Runs on a leash are not good for a puppy’s growing joints.

Once over 6 months and your puppy is well-trained and well-socialized, you can slowly add some jogging to your walks. Make sure the jog does not cause the puppy to break a trot and do not over-do it. However, still, your puppy needs time to run off-leash for additional exercise.

The Leisurely Stroll

Also, until your puppy is trained to a certain level, the purpose of a leash walk cannot be for you to enjoy a leisurely stroll. For now, the leash walk will be work. But the work will be worth it! If you put the work in now, your leisurely stroll will be far more enjoyable in the not-so-distant future.

Why Should Your First Priorities be Training and Environmental Desensitization?

A puppy needs to be trained to focus on a handler before he can be expected to remain in a reasonable position with regard to the handler. A puppy also needs to develop a level of self-control prior to being asked to refrain from jerking and pulling when he wants to get to something. In addition, a puppy cannot pay attention to walking in the correct place if the distraction level is too high. Taking a puppy out on the street before training and before socialization and desensitization take place will set your puppy up for failure. Set him up for failure and you’re going to eventually create bad habits. Bad habits are much harder to break than training a puppy right to begin with.

Therefore, the best course of action is to desensitize the puppy to whatever scares him, to gradually build his ability to handle distractions, to teach him to focus on you, and to gradually build his self-control before you ask him to go on a walk without training as your main priority.

Further (and most importantly), it is important to concentrate on socialization and environmental desensitization early in the process. This is the most important part of raising a puppy under 16 weeks of age.

The Socialization Period

You will have a window of opportunity for this very important part of raising your puppy that slowly closes at around 16 weeks of age. If you miss this opportunity, your puppy will not grow up to be as confident as he would had he been properly socialized early in his life. You can make up for this time later. However, it will be much more difficult.

How to Move Through the Steps of Our Leash Training Program

The training in each of the steps of this program is never meant to be perfect. You need to reach a certain level of training which will be discussed below before moving to the next step. However, you will never be completely done with any step. You need to continue working your puppy on not only the training step that your puppy has reached, but also on the previous steps.

Step 1: Preliminary Work at Home

Working on step 1 includes work in 5 different areas. First you should be building your puppy’s desire to work with you. Second, you should be teaching your puppy behaviors that he can perform while on leash. Third, you should build self-control in your puppy. Fourth, you need to teach your puppy to focus on you. Fifth, you need to build confidence in your puppy. You can work in all five of these areas simultaneously.

This work should initially take place at home where there are virtually no distractions. A backyard works well for most.

Step 1 If You Have a Summer Brook Puppy

If you have a Summer Brook 10-11 week old puppy, we will have worked with your puppy to where he will have practiced on step 1 more than enough to move to the desensitization step if I were continuing the training here. Our 12 week old puppies will already be working in step 2 (desensitization to the environment).

However, no matter the age you picked up your puppy, you need to acclimate your puppy to you and your home first. Therefore, you need to work in step 1 by practicing what we’ve already taught your puppy in your backyard before moving to step 2. Working in your own yard on step 1 for one or two days should be sufficient before move on to step 2.

Step 1 If You Do Not Have a Summer Brook Puppy

If you do not have a Summer Brook puppy, begin step 1 by teaching your puppy his first behavior. This behavior should be maintaining eye contact while he sits still. If you teach this using marker training and shaping, you will not only be teaching your puppy a new behavior, you will also be working toward achieving the other four step-1 goals at the same time. Your puppy will be learning to focus on you, to have self-control, to develop self-confidence, and to love working with you.

After you teach your puppy to maintain eye contact, teach him a simple hand touch and to sit at your side and stay there. Sitting still will build self-control. A hand touch can be used to guide your puppy back to the correct position when he gets out of position.

Why Build Focus, Self-control, Confidence, and a Desire to Work with You First?

Paying attention to a handler is essential for success in loose leash walking. Dogs who are well-trained at walking on a leash may appear to be looking around at their environment while they just happen to remain in sync with their handler. However, these dogs are still keenly aware of where their handler is, even if it is only with peripheral vision.

This keen awareness of a handler with peripheral vision alone must be trained. Focus needs to be trained so well that a puppy can eventually maintain good focus on the handler while he is focusing on two things at once: the world around him AND his handler.

Building Internal Qualities Should be Priority

Building a love of working with a handler and focus go hand in hand. It is this love of working with you that will give your puppy the motivation to remain focused on you.

Self-control is necessary as you encounter various distractions on a walk. Without self-control, a dog will tend to react to every new distraction that comes along.

Self-confidence is necessary so that your puppy is not afraid of every new thing that you pass on a walk.

Developing these qualities in your puppy is important in every aspect of a puppy’s life, including walking on a leash.

Step 2 in Teaching Leash Walking to a Puppy: Moving Out Into the World

Don’t Forget to Continue Working on Step 1 Training After you Move Up to Step 2

Once you’ve trained your puppy to sit still with eye contact and to do a hand touch, and when your puppy is actively trying to get you to work with him, you can work your puppy on step 2 during the same time period as you’re continuing working with him at home (step 1).

However, don’t stop step 1 work. After you’ve trained your puppy to sit beside you giving eye contact and to do a hand touch, train other behaviors as well. Train your puppy to do a down and to stay there while you back away from him and return. Teach him to go from a down position in front of you to a sit position beside you. Train him to move from your side back to in front of you. Teach him to spin. Ideally, you will also teach your puppy to heel. Do all the initial teaching at home. Then take the training out into the world.

Prepare for the Walk

Before you begin your first walk on a leash, do the following:

1. Make sure your puppy does not have an over abundance of energy. Get him some form of exercise before you leave. See our page on Exercise for some ideas.
2. Make sure your puppy is hungry. You will be using positive reinforcement training. For this type training to work, a puppy needs to want whatever you are reinforcing with. We suggest you initially use food. If you’re puppy is full, he won’t be motivated to work for the food.
3. Put some food in a treat bag and snap it on your waist. I suggest taking the puppy’s entire meal with you. If you don’t use it all, feed the rest to him when you return. Our young puppies who are not overweight or over fed will work for dog food kibble.
4. Put a correctly fitting collar on your puppy. See our upcoming page on collars for more information. Attach a 6 foot leash.

Where to Teach Your Puppy to Walk on a Leash

This second step in teaching loose leash walking is to let your puppy acclimate to new and different environments. Start with the most familiar environments. Gradually over time, acclimate your puppy to more and more distracting and possibly scary environments. On the first day of working away from your back yard, move to the front yard. Then you can take your training on the road getting a little further from your home with each session.

After your puppy is working consistently well in a particular environment, it’s time to move to another one. Always keep your puppy’s ability to adapt to stressful and/or stimulating situations in mind as you consider where to go. Don’t increase the stress level or distraction level too much.

Consider stores and public places. I love to go to parks, Tractor Supply, Home Depot, Lowes, Michaels, and Hobby Lobby to name a few places that welcome dogs. However, don’t go to pet stores or dog parks or any other place with large numbers of possibly unvaccinated dogs until your puppy is fully vaccinated.

Vaccines and Puppy Socialization

It is more important that you get your puppy out and socialized prior to his being 16 weeks than it is for him to be fully vaccinated. The risk for future damage to a puppy’s confidence is greater than the risk of disease. Stores with relatively few dogs are very low risk for a puppy who has had at least one vaccine when he was over 9 weeks. Wait at least 6 days after the vaccine was given before leaving your home. Vaccines for Parvo and Distemper are all you need.

How to Start Step 2

Take your puppy to the selected spot for environmental desensitization. Let your puppy sniff around and interact with his environment until he is comfortable.

Once he’s sniffed around a bit and acclimated to his new surroundings, he should either sit and stare at you or begin offering different behaviors in order to get you to work with him. When your puppy begins showing interest in working with you, oblige him and give him the opportunity to earn his food.

If your puppy doesn’t look to you to work, you need consider the following. Have you adequately prepared for the walk. Look at the section above on preparing for the walk. You also need to make sure you have adequately built a desire to work in your puppy at home. Thirdly, evaluate the environment. Is it too distracting?

Continuing Step 2 With the Summer Brook Puppy

When your puppy looks at you wanting to work, do the following if you have a Summer Brook puppy. Say “right here” and point behind you to cue him to get in heel position. Begin heeling and marking and rewarding. The more distracting the environment, the more often you’ll need to reward your puppy to keep his attention.

No matter how comfortable the environment is to the puppy, you need to reward often. When in step 2 or our program, reward often. Rarely go more than 10 steps without rewarding. Never go more than 14 – 16 steps without rewarding. Reward your puppy often for just sitting in heel position. Take one step and reward. Occasionally take two or three. Sometimes take ten. Make sure the rewards are coming randomly. Don’t be predictable. To maintain good focus, a puppy needs to think that the reward could come at any time.

If your puppy is consistently loosing focus and you are sure that he is completely comfortable with the environment, you may not be rewarding often enough or your rewards may not be random and always coming at the same time (after about the same number of steps). If your puppy thinks that the reward will always come after 6 steps, he will quit looking at you until just before the sixth step.

It is important that you reward occasionally after one step. If you don’t, he’ll start the walk by looking at something else until he thinks it is possible to get the reward. Then something else might catch his eye and you will have more than a momentary loss of attention.

Continuing Step 2 With the Non-Summer Brook Puppy

If you don’t have a Summer Brook puppy and your puppy doesn’t know the “right here” command or how to heel, simply mark and reward for what your puppy does know. As he sits and gives eye contact, say “yes” and give him 3 or 4 pieces of kibble. Move forward a bit and as your puppy follows you, ask him to sit again. Mark and reward repeatedly as your puppy sits still and maintains eye contact. If your puppy maintains eye contact while he is moving, reward him.

It doesn’t matter what your puppy is doing as long as he is actively working with you. You could have taught him any behavior in Step 1. The goal is to teach your puppy to be confident enough in any (and all) environments to be able to focus on and work with you doing something.

Loose Leash Walking in Overstimulating or Scary Environments

When the environment is brand new, make sure you reward often. (This is why you need an entire meal in your training pouch!). If the environment is especially challenging, spend your entire walk time heeling back and forth in essentially the same place or working on a stationary exercise that your puppy knows.

When something new happens, your puppy will probably loose focus on you. This is normal and what I’d expect. Let the puppy experience it as he wants. Don’t make him work until he initiates working with you again. If you’ve accomplished your step 1 goals, he will want to work with you as long as he is comfortable with his surroundings.

If your puppy is distracted or uncomfortable, know that every puppy needs to acclimate to new surroundings. Some might need to get over fears. Others might need to practice self-control if the new surroundings are highly stimulating to him.

Either way, let your puppy interact with the newness in whatever way possible to acclimate your puppy to it. If it is safe, let him sniff the scary thing. Your goal in acclimating your puppy to the environment should be to get him to the point where he chooses to ignore it in favor of interacting with you.

Let the Scared Puppy Fully Experience Whatever Is Scaring Him at His Own Pace

If the puppy is scared, do not do what I’ve seen many trainers recommend: distract him with food. Your puppy does not need to ignore what is scaring him. He needs to fully experience it and process it. If it is something that can be smelled or touched, let him do it at his pace. If it is a sound, let him stop and listen. For more details, see our page on Environmental Desensitization and Socialization.

Yes, your eventual goal is for your puppy to have the confidence to focus on you while ignoring the environment. However, until a puppy is no longer scared of something, ignoring it is simply postponing acclimating to it. Confidence comes from facing fears and learning that they are safe to be ignored.

Don’t Try to Lure a Scared Puppy

If your puppy is scared of something, do not pull or cajole or try to lure your puppy toward the scary thing. Also, don’t get so close to something scary that your puppy tries to pull away from it. Remain at a distance whereby your puppy can comfortably acclimate to it and will quickly re-engage to work with you. See our page on Puppy Socialization for more information on socializing puppies to people, things, and sounds.

Let the puppy experience the new things on his own terms and let him be the one that initiates your working together. If your socialization experience is successful, your puppy will acclimate to whatever scared him and try to re-engage you to work with him. If he doesn’t, you are too close to whatever is scaring him. Move a little further away until your puppy feels safe enough to want to work again. Gradually move closer (which could take minutes or days). Don’t rush this process.

At some point, your puppy will re-orient himself toward you. Begin working with him again. Your work can be heeling. It can be working on a stay exercise.

Anticipate Scary Things

As best as you can, anticipate what might be scary to your puppy so that you can prepare him for it. For example, let’s say your puppy has never experienced a loud truck. You see one is coming down the road. Make sure your puppy is facing the direction the truck is coming from. You don’t want anything scary coming up behind your puppy. Don’t ask your puppy to do anything difficult such as heeling. Instead, simply have your puppy sit and look at you in such a position that he can easily see the truck approaching.

If the puppy is able to maintain eye contact, he is ready for a more difficult distraction. For example, the puppy in the picture at the top of this article is sitting maintaining eye contact while a vehicle approaches from his rear. We set him up for this distraction after he was well desensitized to vehicles approaching from the front. We knew he was ready for this level of distraction. Had the vehicle been an 18-wheeler or a truck pulling a clanging trailer, we would have made sure, the puppy was facing it. If you aren’t sure if your puppy is ready for a certain level of “scariness”, err on the side of caution. Let your puppy face anything potentially scary to him.

Let your puppy decide if he wants to work with you or if he needs to look at the truck. Always let your puppy initiate the starting or the stopping of work while you are in the desensitizing stage of leash training.

Leash Walking a Puppy That Ignores You

When first going into a new environment, your puppy will probably ignore you. This is a normal and healthy part of the process. Your puppy needs to interact with, process, and acclimate to what is going on around him.

However, if you can tell that your puppy is totally comfortable with the environment and he is ignoring you for long periods of time just to entertain himself with sniffing or pulling, you need to go back home and do more groundwork.

There are several possibilities for the problem. Maybe you have not made the training fun enough for him. He might have too much pent up energy. You might not be rewarding often enough. Your rewards could be too predictable. The puppy may not be hungry enough to want to work for you. I cannot stress enough that a puppy that is over fed will not be inclined to work for food. See our page on How Much to Feed Your Golden Retriever.

Where to Practice Loose Leash Walking With a Puppy

As has been discussed, you should begin taking your puppy and working with him in the environments that your puppy feels the safest and is the least distracted in. As your puppy begins to feel comfortable in more and more situations and as he learns to work under more distractions, it’s time to stretch your puppy and expose him to more stressful and highly stimulating environments.

Make sure that the difficulty of the environment is not increasing too fast. If your puppy is too afraid to eat or if your puppy is so distracted that he is excitedly pulling at the leash, you need to leave that environment and go some place where your puppy is less scared and less excited and distracted. If your puppy is overly excited, also consider if your puppy has had enough exercise prior to arriving at your training destination.

Step 3: The Pleasure Walk

When to Start the Pleasure Walk

I recommend continuing the socialization and training leash walks on a regular basis at least until a puppy is over 4 months. These types of walks need to be a priority and be the majority of your puppy’s walks during these early impressionable weeks of your puppy’s life. For my own puppies, I wait until 4 months before taking what I call “pleasure walks”. There is just so much socialization work that needs to be done early, that I prefer to delay pleasure walks. However, it is okay to start pleasure walks earlier as long as you are only walking in places where the puppy is thoroughly acclimated and socialized.

However, on-leash walks can be an enjoyable activity for both a human and his dog. Therefore, let’s talk about how to have a well-mannered leash walking older puppy.

How to Transition from the Socialization Walk (Step 2) to the Pleasure Walk (Step 3)

If you’ve done a good job with your early training, transitioning to this new type walk should be easy. Start your Stage 3 walk without getting your puppy in heel position. Simply, start walking in the direction you want to go. There needs to be clear communication to your puppy as to your expectations. He needs to understand that when you say “right here” and point behind you, you are playing the heeling game. When you move forward without saying “right here”, your puppy should know that he is free to look around while moving.

Your First Pleasure Walk

The first time you start the “pleasure walk”, your puppy will think that you are wanting him to work with you and maintain focus. That’s okay. Praise him for his effort. However, remember that in Stage 2 heeling, you never ask the puppy to heel for more than 14-16 steps before being rewarded. However, for this walk, you will be taking far more than 14-16 steps.

What happens in the puppy’s mind when his reward doesn’t come? Give your puppy verbal praise. If he’s now tall enough for you to pet him under the chin and on the side of his face, pet him. Keep walking at a brisk pace. Eventually your puppy will give up on getting a food reward or something will distract him and he’ll look away. When this happens, don’t react in any way whatsoever. Don’t break your stride. Keep walking.

Many puppies will continue looking up at you for a long time. Many will trot or walk along for awhile looking forward and then look back up at you. Verbally praise them and pet them. I will often pet for as long as the puppy is looking at me (unless they look up so long that my arm tires).

Verbal Praise

The better your work in stage 2, the more your puppy will have become conditioned to enjoy looking up at you while you walk. I am a jogger and my Sydney will look up at me without looking away for over 1/4 mile. She’s done this since she was 6 months old. I don’t even take treats with me. She’s working for the love of the work and for my praise. Good positive reinforcement training will condition a real love for working!

Though this is possible, don’t be disappointed if your puppy is less enthusiastic. Most of the dogs I’ve trained will look forward and all around them most of a walk or jog. They will look up at me sometimes for 20 or 30 seconds while I praise them. When I get tired of praising and look away from them, they look back toward where they are going.

If you are jogging, the movement is the puppy’s reward. Dogs and puppies alike enjoy a slow jog. If you are out for a leisurely stroll, give your puppy a “sniff” break as a reward for good behavior while walking.

Jogging When Leash Walking a Puppy

If you’d prefer these pleasure walks to be a slow jog, that is fine as long as the puppy is over 6 months of age. However, prior to a dog’s growth plates closing, jogs need to be limited to a pace where the dog doesn’t break a trot. Forced running should not be part of a young dog’s life. Running is a good form of exercise, but not for the young dog on a leash.

Growth plates close at different ages, according to the size of the dog and the breed. Golden Retriever growth plates generally close somewhere around 18 months of age. Larger breeds can sometimes take up to or sometimes over 2 years to close. Smaller breeds usually close sooner than 18 months. If you are unsure, your vet can take an x-ray of your dog and they can tell you if your dog’s growth plates have closed.

Don’t Stop Stage 2 Training

Until your puppy is so well desensitized to your environment, don’t hesitate to go back to a Level 2 walk to desensitize your puppy. Take your treat bag with you when first beginning stage 3 walks in case there is a big distraction or something scary.

As your puppy becomes more proficient at ignoring his environment, you can begin spending less and less time in stage 2 (desensitization) training. You can gradually eliminate the treats to where there will be none. Instead the dog’s reward will become simply opportunities to sniff as well as the enjoyment of the walk itself.

Problems in Loose Leash Walking

The Puppy Who Won’t Move Forward

Most puppies will happily follow along with you. If your puppy does not, you need to ascertain why. Usually the problem with a puppy that won’t move is fear. If your puppy is scared or unsure, go back to socializing your puppy to this particular place. If he isn’t moving because he simply doesn’t like to walk, then you need to go back to your socialization walks and make them more fun. For whatever reason, if your puppy doesn’t want to go with you, you need to fix whatever the problem is. Don’t make the puppy go with you by pulling him or popping the leash. Certainly don’t yell at him. You need to make walks a pleasant experience or you will be setting your puppy up for a lifelong battle over leash walking.

The Puppy Who Moves Ahead of You

It would be nice if your puppy would stay perfectly in heel position. However, he probably will not. Most puppies tend to want to walk in front of you. Therefore, you need a plan. You need to set criteria with regard to what position is acceptable and what position is not. Pulling on the leash is never acceptable.

However, I recommend setting the bar higher than simply not pulling. Teach your puppy that he cannot be more than a third of a body-length ahead of you. Once a dog gets further ahead of you than that, he can no longer see you with peripheral vision. He will no longer know where he is in relation to where you are. If he can’t see you, he will inevitably hit the end of the leash.

When your puppy gets more than a third of a body length ahead of you, say either “uh uh” or “no”. Speak in a matter of fact voice. Do not have a tone that communicates anger or sternness. Your goal is not to punish, but rather to give information. Step back one or two steps, point behind you, and tell your dog “right here”. If your puppy doesn’t know the “right here” command, simply wait for him to get himself back in position.

Wait for your dog to get in the correct position before moving forward again.

Teach Your Older Puppy to Back up on Command

I like to teach my dogs to back up. Once learned, it is easier for your dog to back up than to turn around to get back in position. We don’t teach our young puppies to back up because most puppies under 12 weeks are physically unable to coordinate their rather clumsy bodies to walk backwards. Therefore, we teach all our young puppies to turn around and walk back into position and then turn themselves back around. However, by four months of age, most puppies can be taught to back up.

Your First “Pleasure Walks”

Your first few “Pleasure Walks” will probably be more training than pleasure. You’ll spend a lot of time going backwards and forwards. However, dogs learn quickly that it is easier and more fun to keep an eye on you so that they can stay in position than to constantly be backing up. However, dogs do get excited and forget when they see something that is highly stimulating. It will take some time for the learning to become solid enough for the dog to remain in position in spite of distractions.

Distractions When Teaching Loose Leash Walking

Pleasure walks need to be started in low distraction environments. The level of distraction should increase slowly. Increase the distraction level too quickly and you will go back to spending considerable walk time going backwards.

Don’t to Forget to Praise Your Puppy

If your dog is doing especially good, praise him. Dogs love to be talked to. You can also reward him by giving him a break to sniff around and just “be a dog”. Make it fun!

See our blog post on Loose Leash Walking With Positive Reinforcement for more information.

If you are considering using positive reinforcement with your puppy and don’t know where to start, this page will give you an easy to understand list of “Do’s and Don’ts” to help you get started. You can also learn from an informational video with nine puppies who are barely nine weeks old learning to sit, down, stay, and heel. This video demonstrates some of the common problems you might encounter and how to fix these problems. This page is loaded with good information on how to use positive reinforcement in puppy training.

Positive Reinforcement in Puppy Training: Make Sure You Do These Things

Do Control Your Puppy and Your Puppy’s Environment

For positive reinforcement to yield its benefits, your puppy must be well-controlled so that he WILL be successful. The key to good positive reinforcement training is having something positive to reward. You cannot reward a puppy when he is busying himself with inappropriate behaviors. This is such an important aspect of good positive reinforcement training that we will be writing a separate post for this topic alone soon. Control your puppy. Set him up for success!

Do Have a Good Reinforcement Schedule

Start young puppies off with a heavy and consistent reinforcement schedule. Reward often while your puppy is learning something new and while he is being conditioned to enjoy working with you. Then when behaviors become solid and he is obviously enjoying the work, gradually move his reinforcement schedule to being random.

Do Keep Your Puppy Thinking That the Reward Could Come at Any Time

Puppies (and dogs) need to feel like a reward will come any time. This is what keeps them wanting to continue heeling or continue staying in a down for sometimes long periods of time. If a dog thinks the reward could come at any time, he will maintain focus as he anticipates his reward.

However, if you become so predictable that your dog figures out that you only reward after a certain length of time, he will loose focus until he feels like he might get rewarded. For instance, if you never reward a dog for heeling until you have taken at least 5 steps, he will quit paying attention to you until you have taken those first 5 steps. Then if something distracts him during those first few steps when he feels like he won’t be rewarded, he might forget what he’s supposed to be doing altogether.

Keep your reinforcements unpredictable and often enough so that your dog is always anticipating the reinforcement!

Do Build a Strong Foundation for Each Behavior that You Are Training With Positive Reinforcement

Work at a level that is easy for your puppy frequently. One of the biggest mistakes I see is people not working the easier exercises often enough and increasing criteria too fast. When teaching a dog to heel, I will reward the dog for just sitting with good attention and for simply taking one step in position hundreds of time. The same holds true with the stay. I will practice with a dog staying for a short time at a short distance far more often than I will ask the dog to do longer sit/stays or down/stays. Build strong wide foundations for the simplest forms of behaviors and the more complicated longer versions of behaviors will be more solid.

Work your puppy at a level that is difficult for him too much and several things will happen. First of all, he will become frustrated and loose interest in working. Second of all, if the reward isn’t coming as often as your puppy needs it to to build his confidence, he’ll wonder if he’s doing something wrong. Once he starts doubting himself, he’ll start trying other things to earn the reward. At this point, confusion will set in and your training will start to fall apart.

Do Gradually Increase Criteria

Along the same lines of working the easy stuff often, don’t increase the criteria too fast. Don’t even ask your puppy to perform at a higher level once until the lower levels are solid. I can’t stress enough that you need to keep your training fun and not too difficult. Otherwise, your puppy will get frustrated and the training will loose it’s appeal.

Do Use the 95/5 Rule With Positive Reinforcement Training

Make sure you are training at a level where your puppy is successful at least 95% of the time. Don’t let your puppy fail more than 5% of the time. If your puppy is making too many mistakes, make it easier for him or he’ll loose interest in training.

My goal is always to train 100% under my puppy’s threshold of success. However, some failure is inevitable. Don’t let failures happen more than 5% of the time and you’ll build confidence and a desire for the work.

Do Practice the Easy Things, the Basics, and the Foundational Exercises OFTEN

Puppies and dogs need far more repetitions of behaviors than most people realize. Rehearse the easy behaviors far beyond when you think your puppy knows well. Again, the fact that the training must be fun and that too much difficulty takes the fun out of it cannot be over-emphasized.

Do Keep Training Sessions Short

Puppies have short attention spans. For most young puppies with a typical inexperienced trainer, ten minutes several times a day is plenty. If you break your training up into several short intervals, you will reap a tremendous training benefit. Your Puppy will think about his training in between sessions and come back to a subsequent session better than he was at the end of the previous session. End your training before your puppy is ready to quit. Leave him wanting more!

Do Use a Reinforcement that YOUR Puppy Wants

Make sure that your puppy likes whatever it is that you will be using for his reinforcement. The more he likes it, the more motivated he will be to work for it.

Almost all puppies want food. Food is also an easy reward to give. Therefore, for most puppies, we recommend starting training by using food.

However, keep in mind the very important principle that for positive reinforcement to work, the reward needs to be something that a dog actually wants. If your puppy isn’t hungry, food will not be a reinforcer. Always train before meals, if you are using food.

Most importantly, if using food as a reward, do not overfeed your puppy. Most people over-feed their puppies. See our page on How Much to Feed Your Golden Retriever if your puppy is a Golden Retriever. Sometimes, the very fact that you are training with food can cause your puppy to overeat. If you are training frequently, take the amount of food you are using for training out of your puppy’s daily food ration.

Do Mark the Behavior With Timeliness

Timeliness with regard to reinforcement is crucial to the success of yourIf you wait too long before letting the puppy know that he did the right thing, he will have likely moved on to doing something else. Your slow response will essentially be rewarding that something else he is doing. Timeliness is one of the most important component of good training.

Positive Reinforcement in Puppy Training: DO NOT do the Following

When Training a Puppy First Thing in the Morning or When He is in a High Energy State, Lower Your Expectations

Puppies in a high energy state of mind have a hard time concentrating and an even harder time with self-control. Training in this state is okay as long as you lower your criteria for reward and have lots of patience. For inexperienced trainers, we recommend waiting until your puppy is in a calmer state of mind.

Don’t Train a Puppy That is Ready for a Nap

Conversely, puppies need enough energy to be able to focus well. Puppies that are sleepy don’t do as well in training as puppies that have adequate energy. Your puppy will be easier to train if he has a balanced amount of energy. He shouldn’t be over the top energetic and neither should he be exhausted.

Do Not Reward Your Puppy for Focusing on a Treat. Positive Reinforcement Training Is Not the Same as Treat Training!

The reward can be a treat, but the focus must be on you. Puppies need to know that the reward comes THROUGH YOU. In order to earn a reward, a puppy needs to look to you for it. Therefore, don’t show a treat to a puppy before a behavior is performed. This will turn the reward into a bribe instead of a reinforcement. More on this in a later blog post.

Do Not Use Luring on a Regular Basis

Dogs trained primarily with luring will learn to focus on treats and will never learn to shift that focus to a person. Reserve luring for those difficult behaviors that cannot be trained with shaping. How to use shaping will be another up-and-coming page.

Don’t Name a Behavior Until It is Solid

Repeating a command over and over before a puppy has learned what he is doing will cause him to learn to ignore your voice. This is especially true with regard to a recall, but this principle applies to teaching anything. You want your puppy to be in-tuned to you. Therefore, reserve speaking to your puppy for when he understands what he is listening to. A puppy that is used to hearing constant commands that mean nothing to him will quickly develop a habit of tuning you out.

Don’t Train if You are Feeling Impatient

Your state of mind is vitally important to a successful training session. Dogs and puppies can read and feel frustration if you have it. You need to be setting a tone of confidence and fun. You cannot successfully do that if you are frustrated or angry.

If your puppy isn’t cooperating as you had hoped and you begin to feel impatient, stop training. Do something else. Then before you train again, take some time to think about what you might could do better next time to help your puppy understand what you want from him. While you are taking a break and re-thinking your training, your puppy will be thinking about how he can do better too. Puppies trained with good positive reinforcement love to think about their training in between sessions! You might be surprised at how much your lesson has begun to click with your puppy in between sessions.

Do Not Assume an Incorrect Response is a Refusal or Willful Disobedience

Usually incorrect responses and what appears to be refusals are caused by confusion, not a strong will. It is quite common for puppies who have been doing a behavior well for even weeks to suddenly forget what he’s supposed to do. There are a myriad of reasons why dogs can get confused. Don’t assume the worst of your dog.

Don’t Ask Your Dog to Perform the Hard Things Often: Success is Key For Good Positive Reinforcement Training

Training sessions should be composed primarily of easy repetitions of exercises. Throw in what the puppy would consider a difficult expectation only occasionally. Never ask a dog to do something often until that something becomes fairly easy for him.

For example, you are teaching your puppy to stay in a down position. He has been consistent with his downs over 95% of the time at a distance of 5 feet for 5 seconds. It’s time to increase criteria and for you to back up 7 feet occasionally. Don’t stop repetitions of 5 feet and jump exclusively to 7 feet. Continue working with your puppy on the easy repetitions to build confidence and desire to work. Over time increase the number of 7 foot stays in a training session all the while keeping your puppy consistently doing it right at least 95% of the time.

Videos of Puppies in Training with Positive Reinforcement

This video of nine puppies doing obedience work should be helpful in fixing some of your puppy’s problems. These puppies are between the ages of 9 weeks 1 day and 9 weeks 3 days. They are in the early stages of learning and making mistakes. Watch the videos to learn how to fix some of the mistakes that your puppy might be making.

Also, see our page on After Puppy Pick up for more tips and a longer video. The After Puppy Pick Up video was created purely to show how to train with positive reinforcement and how to continue the training that we start at Summer Brook Acres.

Other Pages on Positive Reinforcement

See some of our other pages on positive reinforcement such as our pages on Why Reward Based Training is Better Than Punishment Based

The best way to stop leash pulling is to alternate between positive reinforcement for walking politely on leash and stopping forward motion when a dog pulls. Dogs trained by this method will learn to walk politely on leash without risking any of the side effects that punishment based training carries with it. However, the biggest benefit to training this way is that the dogs will learn to WANT to practice loose leash walking.

Unlike the apparent quick behavioral changes that occur with punishment based training, this method takes time and consistency. However, the benefits of positive reinforcement to stop leash pulling far outweigh any benefits (or detriments) of punishment based training. The extra time is time well spent and we’ll show you in this post the details for how to do it!

It Even Works With Puppies!

The puppies in the video below are 8 1/2 weeks old and have never had a punishment of any kind. They were trained with 100% positive reinforcement. We have trained almost 100 puppies with this method. I’ve also trained and successfully shown at obedience trials almost a dozen dogs to heel competitively. It works for us. It can work for you!

So where do you start in training your dog to stop leash pulling? This depends on whether or not your dog has already developed a habit of pulling. Ideally, you’ll start with positive reinforcement as we have with the puppies above. It is best to start making loose leash walking into a fun game before the first attempt at pulling happens. In other words, stop leash pulling before it ever starts.

However, most families don’t start training loose leash walking until leash pulling is already a habit. Further, at some point all puppies and dogs will attempt to pull when the reinforcement level goes down low enough or when the distraction level goes up high enough. Even the puppies in the above video will test the waters eventually.

How to Stop Leash Pulling – Stop Forward Motion

So let’s start our discussion on how to stop leash pulling before we discuss how and when to reinforce loose leash walking.

There must be a consequence for leash pulling for it to stop. Stopping forward motion is a great consequence. Dogs don’t like it, but it isn’t painful. It is easy for the handler. It requires little to no skill. Simply stop moving or take a step (or two or three steps) backward every time your puppy or dog breaks the criteria that you set. Sounds simple, but there are some details that will make your training more successful.

Step Back to Maintain Balance

If maintaining your own balance is difficult or if you can’t COMPLETELY stop forward motion (including allowing your dog to pull your arm forward even an inch), step backwards a step or two or three. If you allow your dog to pull forward AT ALL, he will have essentially received a reward or reinforcement for pulling. Don’t let him be successful in pulling!

Be Consistent

For dog training (with any behavior) to yield its greatest benefit, you must be consistent. You must stop your dog’s forward motion every single time your puppy forges ahead.

Set Criteria

Set a definite criteria for your puppy. Your puppy needs to know exactly what your expectations are. When first teaching loose leash walking (especially with young puppies), our criteria before stopping forward motion is a loose short leash. The puppy can feel the tightness of the leash and he can see his position with relation to yours.

Gradually as your puppy becomes more proficient, you can make your criteria more difficult and require your dog to stay closer to a true heel position. The most important thing is that you consistently stick to your criteria (whatever it is) until your puppy is rarely pulling. Then, you can increase your expectations and change your criteria.

Don’t Leave Too Much Slack in Leash

Don’t leave too much slack in the leash until your puppy or dog’s habit is loose leash walking more often than leash pulling. I like to use a 5 foot leash to give my puppies a chance to sniff and potty. However, I keep my leash tightened to about 3 feet when walking an untrained dog. Either double the leash over in one hand or hold the excess slack in the opposite hand from the one controlling the dog. Either way, don’t give your dog more than a foot’s extra slack. If your dog is a foot ahead of you, he can still see you with peripheral vision. If you let your dog get more ahead of you than a foot, he will loose sight of you. Once he looses sight of you, he’ll loose interest in you.

Use Appropriate Collar

Use an appropriate collar, halter, or harness. I use a buckle or a martingale collar. However, there is a place for other types of collars or harnesses. Soon, we’ll be posting an article on the various uses (and abuses) of the different types of collars that are available. Check back (or sign up to receive email notifications of new posts).

Be Matter Of Fact

Do not show any emotion when your puppy pulls on the leash. Simply stop his forward motion. As much as possible, the puppy needs to feel like he himself caused the consequence; not you. Just stand still or take a few steps backwards when your puppy reaches the end of the leash and is more than a foot ahead of you. You don’t need to say anything.

Give a Command

When starting a training session or a walk, use a command such as “Let’s Go” to signal to your puppy that he is now working and is no longer free to sniff around and pull to anything that interests him.

Walk In Opposite Direction

If you are having trouble realigning your puppy or dog to being beside you after stopping forward motion, turn around and go the other way. This will put your dog behind you. However, be careful not to turn so abruptly that you jerk your dog. Be careful with your leash. The idea is to physically stop forward motion, not to punish your dog by causing him to get a jerk.

How to Stop Leash Pulling – Use Positive Reinforcement

The most powerful tool to stop leash pulling is positive reinforcement. This simply means giving something (or adding something positive to the dog’s life) in order to make the desired behavior more likely to be repeated. It is as easy as rewarding your dog when he is walking politely on a leash. Below are some tips that will make your positive reinforcement training easier and faster.

Use Anything Your Dog Likes For a Reward

You can reward your dog with anything that he enjoys. Food is often used as a reward because it is easy to give and most dogs like it. However, there are many other options. Opportunities for play (such as with a tug toy) could be a great reward for some dogs and one of my personal favorite rewards for loose leash walking is an opportunity to sniff and explore.

Reward Often Initially

Reward often when you are first starting this process (and by often, I mean every step or two in the first session). In the beginning, reward your dog occasionally for just looking at you before even taking a step. Reward for simply taking one step. Sometimes reward for two or three steps. On the second or third training session, you can occasionally hold off on rewarding until the dog has taken 5 or 6 steps.

If your dog is pulling often, your rate of reward is probably not high enough. Make sure you reward BEFORE your dog charges forward. You need to build a habit in your dog of walking beside you and good habits are only built when dogs are consistently doing the right things. Reward often enough and your dog will WANT to practice loose leash walking.

As your dog becomes more proficient at loose leash walking, you can gradually extend the amount of time between rewards. Eventually the goal is random rewards. Your dog needs to think that a reward could come at any time until he is classically conditioned to enjoy loose leash walking. Once your dog is to this point, an occasional “good boy” or scratch behind the ear or under the neck is sufficient. However, don’t rush the process; it takes time.

Don’t Make This Common Mistake

Don’t make the mistake of rewarding a puppy immediately after he pulls and then gets back in position and puts slack back in the leash. Your dog, no doubt, needs to be rewarded when he is keeping slack in the leash and yes, he’s been good to get back in position. However, dogs can quickly get wise to the fact that you will reward him immediately after he pulls and then reorients himself.

You must reward more often while your dog is walking well. He must learn that consistent good walking is what earns the treat; not the pulling and then walking well routine! Otherwise, he will learn that the reward is for pulling and then getting back in position. Instead, he should be learning that the reward is for STAYING in position.

Keep Training Sessions Short

Your initial leash walking training sessions need to be very short (no longer than 10 minutes). Keep your training sessions short enough to where your puppy is still enjoying the “game” of working for a reward. Gradually increase the length of time you train depending on how interested your dog is in it.

Give Adequate Breaks From Training

Occasionally give your puppy a chance to be free to sniff around. Don’t expect an untrained dog to perform loose leash walking for too long in a stretch.

Start with short walks interspersed with free time to sniff around. Five minutes at a stretch is a good starting place.

Gradually build up the length of your walking stretches without free time as your puppy becomes more proficient at loose leash walking without leash pulling.

When you’re ready to end your puppy’s sniffing time and to move forward with your walk again, reorient your puppy to you by using a command such as “Let’s go”.

Reward With a Break to Sniff

Once you get to the point of being out in a distracting environment and keeping your dog’s attention on you and not pulling, reward with access to the environment. What I mean by this is to release your dog (with a release command such as “okay” or “free” or “yes”) when he is practicing loose leash walking. When you release him, run towards and allow your dog to go and sniff and explore whatever it is that he is wanting to get to (unless it is something dangerous of course!).

Gradually Increase Distractions

Start the process in a location with very little distractions. Gradually add distractions as your dog becomes proficient with the current level of distractions. Don’t move too fast in adding distractions. Distractions are the primary reason for pulling. You need to train at the level where your dog is successful at least 80% of the time or your dog won’t enjoy the process and your training will be undermined. However, your goal eventually should be a dog that is relaxed on a loose leash even in distracting environments.

Don’t Start This Training When Your Dog is Full of Energy

If you have a high energy dog, provide your dog with another form of exercise BEFORE your training session. Many dogs pull simply because they have pent up energy and want to go faster than you want to go.

Don’t Use Food Rewards With a Dog That Isn’t Hungry

If you are using food as a reward, your dog needs to be hungry. The key to positive reinforcement training is that the reward needs to be something that the dog wants. Many people overfeed their dogs (and especially puppies) and then wonder why their dogs don’t work for treats.

Have a Consistent Criteria

Just like you need to have a consistent criteria for when you stop forward motion, you need to be consistent with your criteria for rewards. Your criteria for a reward needs to be higher than your criteria before you stop forward motion. For example, if your criteria for stopping forward motion is the dog getting more than a foot ahead of you, then your criteria for reward might be that your dog is not ahead of you at all. Another option is to reward when your dog looks up at you. Gradually increase your criteria.

Reward Effort

Reward effort as well as good behavior. If your dog is focused on you and is obviously trying, reward him even if he isn’t exactly where he needs to be. If dogs try repeatedly, without being rewarded for their effort, they loose motivation. Keeping a dog motivated to please you is just as important (if not more) than training your dog to perform a behavior.

Teach Your Dog to Focus on You

Teach your dog to focus on you instead of the treats. I like to keep my treat bag on my hip instead of in the front of me so that I can discretely get the treats out. Another technique for presenting treats is to keep the treat bag on the right side of you (when the dog is on the left side of you) so that you can pull the treats out of the bag with your right hand. Then transfer the treat into your left hand just before giving the treat to your dog.

Use Marker Training

Use a clicker or a marker word to mark the moment that the dog is doing well. We like to use the word “yes”. See my daughter’s blog post on marker training if you don’t know what it is.

DO NOT BRIBE YOUR DOG

For positive reinforcement training to do its work, your reward cannot be a bribe. This is the most important tip I can give you. The difference between an appropriate reward and a bribe is timing of when the reward is presented. A bribe is when you show the dog the treat BEFORE the behavior is performed.

Luring makes heavy use of bribing which is why we rarely use it.

A bribe is the process of showing a dog a treat as if to say, “Here is a treat; is it worth it to you to do what I ask in order to get it?” The correct attitude from the dog’s perspective should be, “I MIGHT get rewarded if I do what I’m being asked to do”. Dogs that are accustomed to treats being presented before being asked to do something will never be conditioned to work without the treats.

The dog should never KNOW when a reward is coming, but instead be expecting that the reward could come at any time. If a dog is rewarded this way, the dog will eventually become conditioned to enjoy the behavior that brings the reward almost as much as the reward itself. This is a scientific principle known as Classical or Pavlonian Conditioning. Have you ever heard of Pavlov’s dogs? Read more about it on our page on Classical Conditioning.

Final Thoughts

The above method works and though it takes more time to teach than punishment based training, the results are much more solid. Dogs trained this way don’t need the threat of punishment which is never-ending with dogs trained with punishments.

Positive reinforcement training makes heavy use of classical conditioning as mentioned earlier. THIS is why I love it: dogs will eventually be conditioned to enjoy the behavior that is paired with the reward. A dog correctly trained with positive reinforcement will eventually learn to LIKE loose leash walking. With punishment-based training, the punishments must go on forever. With positive reinforcement, the rewards can be faded and the learning “sticks”.

I no longer take treat bags on jogs with any of my dogs. Still, the dogs will periodically look up at me with a big happy smile. I will reward them with a scratch under the chin. Often they will trot along for 20 or 30 steps looking up at me while I keep petting them under their chin. When I get tired of petting, they look back at where they are going. We jog for awhile longer and the dog will look back up at me smiling. It is almost as if the dog is saying, “Look at me. Aren’t you proud of me? Isn’t this fun?”

Classical conditioning is one of the two most important principles of learning used in behavior modification and dog training. An understanding of classical conditioning will give you a valuable tool for training any dog.

Classical conditioning has been studied in all kinds of animals including humans and dogs. We will limit our discussion here to how it works with dogs.

What is Classical Conditioning

Classical conditioning in simple terms is the act of passing the value of one thing or event to another. It is a process whereby two events are paired together in a particular way that causes a dog (or any animal) to begin to enjoy an event that he initially had no interest in simply because it was repeatedly paired with an event that the dog liked.

Here is a more scientific definition for those who like more detail.

Classical conditioning is the pairing of two stimuli or reinforcers where one is neutral and the other has value. When paired a sufficient number of times, the neutral stimulus or reinforcer will gain a value of its own.

This definition has a lot of big words in it and perhaps is difficult to understand. It will become clear as I explain it with examples.

Clicker Training & Marker Training

Marker training and clicker training methods are built on classical conditioning. These are the particular tools that are useful to positive reinforcement dog trainers. Therefore, I’ll explain how classical conditioning works as I relate it to marker training.

The Two Stimuli (or Events)

We’ll talk first about the thing that a dog initially finds valuable. This is called the primary stimulus in scientific terms. Then we’ll talk about the event that the dog initially sees no value in. The scientific term for the event that is the dog sees no value in is the secondary stimulus.

Let’s look at these two stimuli.

The Primary Stimulus

The primary stimulus can be anything that a dog likes. There are various sights or sounds or circumstances that will evoke either a negative or positive response in a dog. For example giving a dog food will elicit a positive response in most dogs. They will get excited and salivate. Food is therefore what is referred to as a primary stimulus or a primary reinforcer. An opportunity for play is another example of a primary stimulus or reinforcer. Dogs respond favorably to such opportunities.

The Secondary Stimulus

The secondary stimulus can be any of the many sights, sounds, and circumstances that are irrelevant to a dog’s world. An example of such an irrelevant stimulus would be a clicker. Clickers in and of themselves are neither scary or painful; nor are they exciting. They have no value to a dog and will typically be ignored. However, if you pair a clicker enough times with a positive primary stimulus such as food, the clicker will begin to take on value to the dog.

For example, if I click a clicker just before rewarding a dog with food enough times, the dog will begin to associate the clicker with the reward. The dog will begin to have an automatic response to the clicker. He will get excited. He might salivate.

This same response can be conditioned with any particular sound. I like to use a marker word rather than a clicker. However, the secondary reinforcer can be any neutral sound (or even a sight)

Causes an Involuntary Response

A key component of classical conditioning is the fact that the response to it is involuntary. When classical conditioning has taken place, the response is not a decision. The dog does not think it through. It is an automatic, instinctual, response that happens whether the dog wants it to or not. When you pair a positive stimuli or reinforcer with a neutral stimuli or reinforcer enough times, a dog will become classically conditioned to enjoy the neutral stimuli or reinforcer.

Once a dog is classically conditioned to have this involuntary response, there will be a chemical reaction in his brain: a release of dopamine.

The Neutral Stimulus (Marker) Must Occur Before the Primary Stimulus (Reward Such as Food)

In order for classical conditioning to occur, the neutral secondary stimulus (the clicker, for example) that we are wanting to classically condition must occur BEFORE the primary stimulus. In other words, in our example, the sound of the clicker must occur before the food reward is given. Classical conditioning will not occur if the clicker is used simultaneously to the giving of the food reward. Nor will it work if the clicker is used after the giving of food.

Ivan Pavlov and His Dogs

Science gives Ivan Pavlov the credit for discovering the principle of classical conditioning. We refer to this principle as Pavlovian conditioning as well as classical conditioning. Pavlov discovered this principle with an experiment with dogs. Pavlov rang a bell just before feeding every meal. With time, the dogs began to salivate when the bell was rung, whether Pavlov brought food out or not.

Final Thoughts

Classical conditioning is a valuable tool for all dog training. Positive reinforcement trainers in particular will find this tool valuable. Trainers can condition dogs to value a neutral stimuli such as a marker word or a clicker just as much as a naturally valuable reward such as food.

Once the marker attains value, it becomes an extremely useful training tool providing a means to attain Clear Communication and Powerful Motivation.

Though we prefer positive reinforcement over punishments, we can’t deny the fact that there are families that feel that they must use punishments. If you choose to use punishments with your dog, the punishment guidelines on this page give instruction on how to use punishments in dog training.

Punishments cannot be taken lightly. They must be used with great care. This page is written from the perspective of someone who considers herself a positive reinforcement trainer. I rarely (if ever) use punishments. However, I understand both sides of the argument for and against punishments. If you choose to punish your dog, please consider adhering to these guidelines.

There are reasons that many feel that punishments are helpful and there are certainly times when some would even deem them necessary. 100% reward-based positive reinforcement training is more time-consuming than a training program that incorporates a few punishments. In addition, training with no corrections whatsoever can be difficult for many typical pet owners, especially those lacking adequate dog training skills.

However, keep in mind that most behaviors can be stopped with positive reinforcement along with negative punishments (taking something away from the dog that he enjoys), control, diversion, extinction, and/or patience. Read our page entitled Stop Bad Behavior Positively for more information on how to stop bad behavior without resorting to punishments.

Positive reinforcement training is better than punishment based training. See why on our page on Why Positive Reinforcement is Best. However, for those times when you feel you need a correction, here are a few guidelines.

The Dog Must Understand Why

The first and most important guideline in giving punishments is that the puppy or dog must understand what he has done wrong. You must be absolutely sure that your dog is not simply confused. Many people overestimate what dogs know and understand.

For instance, dogs do not generalize learning the way people do. A dog that has been taught to sit in the kitchen will usually not know what he is being asked to do when he is asked to sit on the front lawn. You must teach in a wide variety of places and in a wide variety of situations before full learning takes place.

Further, if your dog is in a more stressful or highly stimulating environment than he is highly acclimated to, his abilities to think clearly will drastically be reduced. It could appear that the dog is refusing to obey when in actuality, he is merely confused.

If there is any doubt, do not give a punishment. Don’t leave your dog feeling confused about what caused the punishment.

This is one of several reasons that we do not punish very young puppies. You need to teach behaviors before you can successfully correct a dog for not doing them. Understanding has to be solid or a punishment will do more harm than good.

The Dog Must Know How to Stop The Correction

This leads me to the second vitally important guideline. The dog must know how to correct his behavior and stop the correction. You must make absolutely sure that you are not leaving your dog in a position of being confused as to how to stop the correction.

Only Use Punishments To Stop Poor Behavior

Our third guideline is to only punish behaviors that cannot be easily corrected with reward based training. I wouldn’t even consider a punishment for anything other than stopping self-rewarding behaviors. Positive reinforcement along with control is always a better way when teaching a dog to DO something. Reserve punishments for teaching a dog what he should NOT DO.

Don’t Use Punishments To Teach Good Behavior

For example, if you are teaching a puppy to sit or down or stay, there is no reason EVER to punish him when he doesn’t do what you ask. There could be several reasons for his lack of compliance, all of which can be easily remedied with reward based training and positive reinforcement.

Reserve Punishments for Self Rewarding Behaviors

The fourth guideline is to reserve punishments for self-rewarding behavior. There is no need to punish behaviors that are not intrinsically rewarding to the dog. If there is no reward, the behavior will disappear on its on.

How Strong Should the Punishment Be?

The fifth guideline is to make the punishment just strong enough to take the reward out of the behavior. However, don’t use a punishment that is so weak that the dog sees the punishment as a nag to be ignored. Punishments do not need to be painful to accomplish this goal. However, they do need to be somewhat uncomfortable and unpleasant. It needs to be a deterrent for the bad behavior, but no more than that.

The Dog Needs To Feel Like He Has Control of the Consequences of His Own Behavior

The sixth principle has to do with how the dog feels about what caused the correction. The dog needs to feel as if he himself has control of the consequences of his own behavior. If at all possible, the dog should feel like he himself caused the punishment to happen. If a dog feels like he caused the punishment, it gives him control over how to stop it. This thought process in a dog greatly reduces any chance of the dog feeling frustrated and confused.

Dogs who feel in control of their own consequences are more inclined to obey the rules than those who are coerced into obeying by domination or a pack leadership mentality. Respect is earned in the dog world. It is not demanded. The pack leadership mentality is old fashioned and out-dated. It has been shown to cause aggression and is not beneficial.

Give Punishments With a Matter-of-fact Unemotional Attitude

The seventh guideline has to do with the person’s emotional state. Punishments need to be given with a matter-of-fact attitude without anger. Yelling or acting out of control are never in order.

An unpleasant consequence just needs to happen to the dog and if possible, he doesn’t need to know it came from you. It is best if he thinks that he caused the punishment himself. If he feels that he can be in control of his own consequences, he will have more motivation to stop the behavior. He will associate bad feelings with the behavior. Otherwise, he will learn to associate bad feelings toward you. The dog needs to see you as a kind and fair leader. He needs to see himself as in control of the consequences of his behavior.

Never Punish a Fearful Dog

The eighth guideline is super important. Never punish a dog who is fearful. For example, if your dog or puppy is pulling on the leash because he is afraid of an approaching loud and large vehicle, a punishment will only escalate the fear. Deal with the fear and then work on loose leash walking at another time when the dog has regained his confidence.

Punishments Should Not Cause Stress or Pain

Our ninth guideline is to keep the punishment non-painful and stress-free. Stress interferes with learning. The goal of the punishment is for the dog to want to figure out how to make the correction go away and how to move back toward the good feelings that come with positive reinforcement. Stress and fear are not compatible with learning.

Corrections should have no emotions attached to them for them to have their maximum benefit. The dog should not feel stressed, frustrated, or angry. The only thing he should feel is motivation to change his poor behavior.

Don’t Let the Correction Linger

After a correction has been used and a dog is being obedient, don’t forget to reward the dog. It is important that you bring that dog right back up into a emotional state.

Consider the Dog’s Temperament and State of Mind

The tenth guideline is consideration of the dog’s temperament and current state of mind. Soft tempered dogs might cave under the slightest correction. Dogs with harder temperaments or dogs who are in a high drive state of mind will need a stronger correction in order to get results. Always err on the side of caution. Do not give too hard of a correction! If your correction is not hard enough, you can always give another.

Do Not Forget to FREQUENTLY Reward Good Behavior

The eleventh guideline is one of the most important. Do not forget to notice and reward good behaviors. Too often, families are busy and the dog only gets noticed when he is acting up. Reward based training won’t work if the dog is not regularly and often being rewarded for good behavior.

Type Punishments to Use

The last guideline involves the type punishment to administer and not to administer. We’ve divided punishments into three categories: those to avoid, those that are okay, and those few that are truly beneficial.

Punishments to Avoid

A few corrections that are never in order include: hitting, screaming, kicking, causing real fear of any kind (though a brief mild startle could be a good option to distract), domination, alpha rolls, ear pinches, strong jerks from a leash, or powerful shocks from a remote collar.

Acceptable (Though Not Ideal) Punishments

Leash corrections are popular and for good reason. Leash pulling is one of the most common self-rewarding behaviors and is a difficult behavior to stop with positive methods alone. Non-painful but uncomfortable “leash pops” can be a good temporary solution as can the corrections that come from a head halter.

Shock collars are another popular punishment. There is a huge movement called “off Leash Training” that is advocated by many “Balanced” trainers. The remote collar is used to fine tune heeling and to give owners opportunity for control without a leash. We don’t use this type training. However, neither do we condemn it if the corrections are carried out absolutely correctly. As with any punishments, GREAT care needs to be taken. We feel that too many families (and trainers) become too dependent on this form of punishment. It is easy. It works. However, we don’t think it is best.

Bark collars are another popular shock collar. Unlike traditional remote collars, you have little control over the collar malfunctioning. I would never use a bark collar unless I was carefully monitoring the dog. Bark collars are not training tools that bring about permanent change. Dogs quickly learn when the collar is on. When it is off, they usually go back to barking.

We don’t like shock collars used with invisible fences for many reasons which are beyond the scope of this article. However, we understand that for some, this might be the only option.

A correctly used remote collar on a low setting could be an okay (though not ideal) option. If you should choose to use a shock collar of any kind, make sure you and the dog have been properly trained to it before using it as a correction tool.

Good Options

Banishment is one of my favorite corrections. Short “time outs” can accomplish a lot. They are unpleasant, yet non-stressful. They give a dog an opportunity to think about how to turn his life back toward reward based training again. A half a minute in a pen or a separate room is an excellent option.

A verbal “no” is a good correction and contrary to popular believe, it does not have to be an angry “no”. Once the word is taught, a calmly spoken “no” gives good information to a positively trained dog.

Front hook harnesses are good tools for training loose leash walking. They don’t cause pain. However, when a dog pulls forward and the leash causes him to turn around, it is indeed a punishment.

Many “positive only” trainers also recommend head halters such as the Halty. These are also punishment tools although they are not considered to be painful. However, head halters, like many other correction tools need to be used with care. Jerk too hard and these halters can be dangerous. Used incorrectly, head halters could be even more dangerous than a prong collar.

Final Thoughts

Punishments should always be reserved as a last resort. Positive reinforcement along with a controlled environment is always better. See our post on How to Use Positive Reinforcement training. Punishments are never really necessary. However, if you are unable to stop poor behavior with positive reinforcements alone, punishments given according to these guidelines are better than allowing bad behavior to continue indefinitely.

Most, if not all, trainers that refer to themselves as “balanced trainers” say that it is not possible to effectively train a dog without using punishments. We totally disagree with this assertion and will discuss some of the reasons why in this post. We will also talk about some of the many other options that yield better results than punishments.

This page was not written to judge those who do add punishments to their training. We have many friends who use corrections in their training and are successful. The purpose of our website is never to judge (unless the punishment is severe or unreasonable). The purpose of this page is not to argue whether corrections are wrong. This page was written to argue the point that equal (or in our opinion better) training is possible without the punishments.

Punishments are Quick Temporary Fixes to Outward Behavior

We believe that punishments are nothing more than a bandaid on most problems. Punishments are quick fixes. They change outward behavior, but in our opinion, they are usually not permanent solutions.

Positive reinforcement training when done correctly goes deeper than outward behavior. Our aim in training is to change the whole dog, not just outward temporary behavior.

Punishment based training can also change the dog on the inside. However, the changes that punishments create on the inside are not the changes trainers are after. Good balanced trainers seek to use punishments in such a way that they don’t affect the dog on the inside. When corrections affect the heart of the dog, it is always through unwanted negative side effects from the punishment.

Positive Reinforcement Training Can Change the Dog from the Inside Out

Our philosophy is built around spending considerable training time conditioning a dog to want to do desirable behaviors and and then building the ability to successfully carry out that desirable behavior. If time is spent up front properly training the dog to have the desire and the ability to perform acceptable behavior, bad behaviors can be drastically (if not totally) reduced.

A Training Example

For example, many dogs are punished for out-of-control behavior. We don’t think that this is the best solution.

Instead of punishing the dog for this type behavior, we’d approach changing his behavior by addressing first of all his desire to act better. We’d use classical conditioning and marker training for this aspect of our training. See our soon-coming pages on these topics by clicking on the links.

Then we’d teach the dog to have the ability to have self-control or what some trainers call impulse control. We’d gradually and incrementally expect more self-control from the dog as he gains the ability to do so. See our soon to come page on Building Self Control for more details.

What is a Punishment?

A punishment is something that is used to decrease a behavior. All punishments are either “positive punishments” or “negative punishments.” A lot of people in the dog training world seem to think that “positive” means “good” and “negative” means “bad”. However, this is not the case.

Using a “positive punishment” means that you are adding something to the training session to decrease a behavior. For example, yanking on the leash, using a shock collar, hitting your dog, and telling your dog “no” are all positive punishments. Obviously, some are much worse than others.

Using a “negative punishment” means that you are taking something away from the training session to decrease a behavior. This is often a fantastic way to train a dog without scaring or hurting your dog.

Here is a good example. Your dog is overly excited to see you. He jumps on you. You leave the room for a few minutes. Leaving the dog is a negative punishment. You have taken something away from the dog that he wants: yourself. This is the negative part or the taking away part. What makes it a punishment is that it will decrease the chances of the behavior being repeated. Continue leaving every time your dog jumps and he will learn that jumping is no fun. It won’t take long for him to stop jumping so that he can keep you around.

Negative punishment is a tremendous tool when training with reward based training. Almost all “positive only” trainers recommend negative punishment. However, the source of controversy is positive punishment. The rest of this page will be about positive punishment only. Therefore, I will be referring to positive punishments as plain “punishments” for simplicity’s sake. I will also occasionally use the word corrections. In this article corrections means the same thing as positive punishments.

Positive Reinforcements are Better and If Done Correctly Will Yield Better Results Than Corrections

We understand the philosophies of both positive-only as well as balanced trainers. We’ve trained using both methods at some point in the past. We know many trainers on both sides of the “Punishments or Not” debate who are very well respected. However, our experience has been and scientific research has proven that positive reinforcement yields better results when done correctly. Read why on our page entitled 10 Reasons for Reward Based Training.

Reward-Based Training Alone IS Possible

Reward-based training alone is possible. Positive reinforcement is better if a person has the skill and desire to master positive training techniques. See our post on How to Use Positive Reinforcement training. The key to successful positive reinforcement training is to learn a few non-punishment based techniques to stop bad behavior. Then use reward-based training to train an alternative behavior.

Non-punishment Training Techniques

So, how do you stop bad behavior without resorting to corrections? There are several excellent techniques that work. As has already been mentioned, negative punishment or taking something away from the puppy that he wants is a very good method for stopping bad behavior. Controlling your puppy and his environment is another way to stop bad behavior. Diverting your puppy’s attention is a third method. Waiting on unrewarded bad behaviors to fade on their own is a fourth. We discuss these techniques in more detail in our article entitled Stop Bad Behavior Positively. These methods are more effective and produce better results than corrections.

Many Positive Only Trainers Advocate Refraining From Telling Your Dog “No”

We disagree. Saying “no” to a dog is indeed a punishment, especially for the sensitive eager to please type dog. However, it is important to us that our puppies and dogs know when they are right or wrong. We will say a calm “no” when they have done the wrong thing. We don’t yell or even raise our voices. Our puppies and dogs know that when they hear the word “no”, they need to try something different in order to earn their reward. Although a calm “no” is not painful, it is indeed a mild punishment. Dogs don’t like to hear it and it is a deterrent to bad behavior.

Positive Training; Not Permissiveness

At the risk of being redundant, we want to make it clear that positive training is NOT the same as permissiveness. Allowing a dog to practice poor behavior is never a good choice. Good reward-based training never gives way to permissiveness.

Final Thoughts

It is possible to train all dogs completely and thoroughly without using painful positive punishments at all. These punishments can have side effects that can cause internal damage to the dog.

Positive reinforcement training, on the other hand, when done correctly can build a dog up from the inside out giving him both the desire and the ability to behave.

Punishments can be a quick fix for outward behavior. Positive reinforcement training might be slower, but when done correctly, it gives longer-lasting better results.

Punishments are not the only way to stop bad dog behavior! There are at least five training techniques for handling bad behavior other than positive punishments. Without these five techniques, positive reinforcement training would not be possible. You can’t train good behavior while the dog is practicing bad behavior at the same time. You must stop the bad before you can train the good. However, you CAN stop bad behavior positively!

Difference Between Positive and Negative Punishments

I want to start this discussion by differentiating between positive and negative punishments.

Positive Punishments

Positive punishments are the type punishments that typically come to mind when you hear about punishments in dog training. As in math, the scientific definition of the word positive is to add something to the equation. This applies to dog training as well. The scientific definition of the word punishment is anything that makes a behavior less likely to be repeated. Therefore, a positive punishment is something added to the dog making a behavior less likely to be repeated.

If you were going to use a positive punishments, you might be using leash corrections or alpha rolls. Any painful consequence that someone could apply to a dog would be a positive punishment. Positive punishments also include non-painful, but unpleasant consequences. Even saying a calm “no” to a dog could be considered a positive punishment. Dogs that have been conditioned to hearing the word “no” to indicate wrong behavior don’t like to hear it.

Negative Punishments

There are also negative punishments. These punishments are those that involve taking something away from the dog that he likes. Just like in math, negative in dog training means taking away something. Again, the definition of a punishment is anything making a behavior less likely to be repeated. Therefore, a negative punishment would be taking something away from a dog in order to decrease the likelihood of a behavior being repeated.

An example of a negative punishment would be to leave the room when your dog jumps on you. What you are taking away from the dog is YOU. Another example would be to stop petting a puppy who is mouthy. In this example, you are taking away the puppy’s opportunity for petting. A third example would be time-outs from a fun activity where you are taking away the puppy’s chance for the fun activity.

The official scientific name, negative punishments, does not sound like a positive-only technique. However, in spite of its name, negative punishments are actually a very positive training method! Taking away something that a dog values is a very good way to stop bad behavior positively.

Control

The most commonly used technique used with almost all reward based trainers is control. Training with positive reinforcement takes time. A controlled environment gives you that time.

However, control is not the ultimate goal. Rather, it is a temporary means of keeping a puppy (or dog) from practicing poor behavior. Then, you can train an alternative good behavior. Eventually, this alternative behavior will be of higher value to the dog than the bad behavior. At this point, the puppy will choose the new more appropriate behavior over the old one.

For instance, if a puppy is chewing your shoes, you can change the environment in one of two ways. You can move the shoes or you can move the puppy. Change the environment to where the puppy no longer has the option of chewing the shoe. Then train him to enjoy chewing something else with positive reinforcement. With enough reinforcement, the toy will become more valuable than the shoe. The puppy will no longer want the shoe.

Another example of using control is the use of pens and crates. Confinement is an integral part of training with positive reinforcement. Pens and crates keep a puppy from developing bad habits while you train good habits.

Control the puppy and his environment in such a way that bad behaviors are not possible. Then training with positive enforcement will change the dog to enjoy a new, more acceptable behavior. Eventually, the new behavior will replace the bad behavior. Control gives you an opportunity to stop bad behavior positively without using punishments.

Diversion

Diversion is another good option for stopping poor behavior. Redirect the puppy to other acceptable options and he will often forget about the undesirable behavior.

Let’s take the same example with a puppy chewing a shoe (or chewing your hand). Divert a puppy’s attention from chewing the object that you don’t want him chewing. Show your puppy a more interesting toy. Make almost any toy move and be active. It will become more enticing than a shoe.

When using diversion, make sure the new behavior is more rewarding than the old one. Then the old behavior will fade away. Diversion is another excellent way to stop bad behavior positively.

Extinction

A third scientific principle of dog training is that any behavior that goes unrewarded for long enough will disappear. This principle is called the principle of extinguishment. The dog will quit the unrewarded behavior as another behavior becomes more rewarding.

Sometimes doing nothing is the best approach as long as the dog is not being inadvertently rewarded for the behavior. This inadvertent rewarding of poor behaviors is what happens with a group of behaviors called self-rewarding behaviors.

Self-rewarding behaviors present a problem with regard to extinguishment. These behaviors are the most difficult behaviors to stop with positive reinforcement techniques alone. In fact, most traditional and balanced trainers claim that these self-rewarding behaviors cannot be stopped without punishments at all. We disagree.

However, you must give special consideration to these behaviors. They do present a challenge. Self-rewarding behaviors can be handled positively, but they require more work. Check back in the next few weeks to see our upcoming post on Self Rewarding Behaviors. This post will give information on what these behaviors are. It will give examples and will have tips on how to stop these difficult behaviors.

Permissiveness and Behavior Management

The fourth way of handling poor behavior is with permissiveness. Many positive only trainers give up on training and resort far too often to permissiveness. This type training is what has given reward-based training a bad name, especially by many “balanced” and traditional trainers. We never recommend permissiveness.

Many “Positive Only” trainers advocate for managing poor behaviors instead of stopping them. They teach families how to live with these unwanted behaviors in the most tolerable way possible.

An example of this would be in the use of top clip halters with some dogs. Top clip halters are designed to give control, not to train. The dog still pulls, but the person has an easier time controlling the dog. If you don’t want to actually train a difficult dog to stop pulling on a leash, this is an acceptable option. However, for many dogs, this option is essentially a decision to give up on training. We would rather train a better behavior than to indefinitely control a poor one.

We are currently writing a series of articles on leash pulling. There will be an entire page on the use of top clip halters alone.

Can Punishments Be an Option?

We recommend non-painful punishments before we recommend permissiveness. However, punishments should only be a last resort for when diversion and control aren’t working.

Further, punishments should only be used when very specific guidelines are followed. See our page on Punishment Guidelines (to be posted soon) for more information. Punishments are never the only option. However, we acknowledge that some people are unable to curtail certain behaviors without resorting to either punishments or permissiveness.

Final Thoughts

The optimum way to handle bad behaviors is to train better alternatives. See our page on How to Use Positive Reinforcement in dog training to learn how to train better alternatives. The better alternative must have a higher value to the dog than the poor behavior. You can build value into any behavior if you reward it enough. Frequent rewards condition a dog to associate good things with behaviors thereby increasing the value of that behavior.

Until the new behavior has been trained, there are 4 valuable tools for stopping bad behavior without using positive punishment. After stopping bad behavior, you can build value into a new behavior. These 4 tools are negative punishment, control, diversion, and extinction. With these tools and positive reinforcement training for an alternative behavior, you can stop bad behavior positively!

Punishments should be used only as a last result. Only use them in cases where you are unable to be successful with positive techniques. Punishments should never become your primary training tool. You should only use them when following very strict guidelines.

Permissiveness is never an option for us. Neither is long-term management of bad behaviors. We prefer training good behaviors that replace the bad. Otherwise, a person must control and manage the bad behavior for the life of the dog.

Opinions on whether or not punishments should be part of a training program are strong. There are valid arguments on both sides of the “punishments or not debate”. We will discuss 10 reasons that we strongly believe that reward based training produces better results than punishments and why we believe that positive reinforcement dog training is better.

1. Side Effects From Improperly Given Corrections

Many reward based or positive reinforcement trainers talk about the number of clients coming to them with dogs that have emotional scars from inappropriately given punishments. These families had not intentionally harmed their dogs and more often than not the punishments were not severe. The families were simply following advice they had received either from traditional or “balanced trainers” or from out-dated books or TV shows. These families were trying to do what was best for their puppy.

The emotional scars from punishments are generally caused by the average dog owner’s lack of skill in ascertaining exactly how corrections might be affecting the dog. For dogs to avoid incurring side effects from corrections, the dog must understand what he did to cause the correction; he must know exactly how to stop the correction from recurring; and the correction must be precisely timed.

To be clear, we are not saying that punishments always (or even usually) cause side effects or emotional scars. However, we have talked to many people who have worked with dogs who have problems caused by poorly given punishments. We have also seen it first hand. It can and does happen; especially with people with little dog training experience.

2. Side Effects from Emotionally Charged Corrections

Further, punishments that are given in anger or that cause fear in a dog or that come from a place of domination can leave deep long-term emotional damage. Emotionally charged punishments can be more damaging than physically painful punishments. Harsh corrections given with an attitude of domination can even cause aggression. 

3. Reward Based Positive Reinforcement Training Builds Confidence

Thirdly, dogs trained primarily with positive reinforcements are more confident than dogs trained primarily with punishments.  Dogs love to work for rewards. Being successful builds confidence.  Dogs who work because they fear a correction if they make a mistake can become timid. They do not have the drive to work that dogs trained primarily with rewards have.

Many punishment based trainers will set their dogs up for failure so that the dog will learn what is NOT acceptable. For example, they will recommend intentionally leaving shoes out on the floor so that a person has an opportunity to correct the puppy for picking them up. I do advocate what is commonly called “proofing” in the dog training world.

Proofing is a necessary part of dog training. However, training works far better when the temptations to fail are AFTER the puppy is thoroughly trained in the behavior; never before. When the temptations come at the right time and the puppy can successfully resist them, his confidence and his desire to please will grow.

Reward based trainers will set their dogs up for success so that the focus is on what IS acceptable instead of what ISN’T acceptable. Gradually the unacceptable behaviors will be replaced by the acceptable and the dog will build confidence in the midst of his success. Then, and only then, are you ready to “test” your dog to see if his behavior is solid in the midst of distractions and temptations. These distractions and temptations should be at an appropriate level so that your puppy will remain successful. The goal is not to cause failure, but rather to gradually make his successful behavior more solid, even in the midst of distractions.

Reward-based training builds on one building block of success after another. Punishment based training is built on fighting fires and correcting problems. Both types of training have the same ultimate goal. However, the two methods are totally different with regard to the foundation the training is built on. The type of training foundation will determine if training is building confidence or tearing it down.

4. Dogs Raised Primarily With Positive Reinforcement Develop a Stronger Bond to Their Person

Fourthly, positive reinforcement reward based training builds a relationship between a dog and a person.  It makes a dog want to be with you, to try to please you, and to feel good when around you.  Dogs trained primarily with rewards respect and want to follow their person. This respect is earned. It is not forced upon the dog by a “pack leadership” mentality. It is real and comes from the heart of the dog.

5. Reward Based Training is Fun For the Person

Reward based training is also fun for the person. Therefore, there is incentive for families to train their puppy more often. There is a tremendous thrill in watching a dog purposely try to figure out how to please you.  It is not fun to constantly be doing battle with your dog. 

6. Punishment Based Training Kills Motivation

Because punishment based training is not fun for the dog, it kills the motivation to train. Dogs trained primarily with punishments come back to training session after training session with the same old “do I have to?” attitude. Dogs trained primarily with corrections submit, but without the same happy attitude that a dog who is trained primarily with rewards. 

7. Reward Based Training Builds Motivation

On the other hand, reward based training is extremely enjoyable for the dog. The more they train, the more they want to train. Reward based training creates a happy desire to work.  Dogs trained primarily with reward-based training actively seek out opportunities for training.  They work with drive and enthusiasm. 

Dogs trained primarily with rewards enjoy training so much that every dog I’ve ever trained thinks about their training even when not training. My dogs and puppies leave a training session and ponder where they were successful and where they weren’t. Then they come back to the next training session having worked out in their own minds how to do better. This principle of reward based training is still mind-blowing to me, even after training for many years.

I started my own training career with traditional punishment based training because I didn’t know any better. I’ve learned first hand. Reward based training is FAR more motivational to a dog!

8. Reward Based Training Builds Trust

All dog’s crave the comfort of knowing that there is someone they can trust, someone who will be taking care of them even in stressful situations. A dog’s owner should be a source of comfort and strength during stressful situations. If training is primarily punishment based, a dog may not look to their person for strength and stability in times of stress.

For example, if a person should go into a scary environment with their dog, a dog trained with rewards will look to his person for affirmation that all will be okay. However, if your relationship is characterized by punishments, the last last thing the dog will want to do to see if “all is okay” is to look at you. He will instead be afraid that you will add more stress to an already stressful situation by punishing him if he doesn’t act exactly right.

9. Punishments Change Behaviors Only

Punishments will have an immediate effect on a dog. Corrections work in changing behavior. They bring a short term fix for behavioral problems. Often, that is all that people hope to attain. However, if you could have more, would you want it? If you could change more than just the behavior, would you change your training method in order to accomplish this? What if you could change the dog himself?

10. Reward Based Training Changes the Dog Himself

 This is (in our opinion) the biggest reason for using reward based training. When correctly done, reward based training will change a dog’s desires, will channel a dog’s drive, and will change what a dog enjoys doing.  In short, reward-based training will train a puppy to WANT to do what you want him to do, rather than merely training him to submit his will to yours.  

Reward based training changes a dog from the inside out by changing his emotional make-up and what he enjoys doing.  Punishment based training changes behaviors, but does nothing to change the dog himself.  Punishment based training can be a quick fix for a behavior.  Though correction based training usually appears to get the job done in terms of behavior, it does not address the roots of bad behaviors nor does it build an innate desire for good behavior.  This fundamental change in the dog is the primary reason that our program at Summer Brook is built on reward-based training.

Related Posts

We use only positive reinforcement training with young puppies as well as in training a dog for competitive obedience. However, we understand both sides of the “Punishments or Not” debate including the reasons behind those who claim that positive reinforcement alone is not enough. For us, it is enough. However, we’ve written another post addressing the subject of whether or not punishments could EVER be helpful. See our page entitled Are Punishments Necessary to Train Your Dog.

For help in stopping bad behavior without using punishments, see our page entitled Stop Bad Behavior Positively.

Final Thoughts

Punishments are risky. Reward-based training is not. Change your dog to want to do what you want him to do. See our page on How to Use Positive Reinforcement in Dog Training to learn how. There will be no need for corrections. There will be no battle. You can have a harmonious, stress-free relationship with your dog! Your dog will want to be with you and will trust you, even in stressful situations. You will enjoy a well-mannered dog. Your dog’s desires will start to line up with yours. Is this not the reason we have dogs to begin with?