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Popular Myths on Positive Dog Training

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You use food to bribe the dog.

Using food in training is not a bribe, it is a reward and a way of reinforcing the desirable behavior. It is a simple scientific law, when consequence is pleasant, the action happens more; when consequence is unpleasant, the action happens less. Food is not the only reinforcing item to a dog, you may also use praise, shelter, comfort, water, sex, attention, play and so forth to reward a dog for good behavior.

 

My dog won't perform if I don't have food.

Here you are assuming your dog finds food rewarding, but for some dogs where food is available all day, it is simply nothing special. For dogs who do, you will have to reward the behavior you asked for with food in the beginning of training to build a foundation, until the dog starts to associate performing that behavior as rewarding. Once the initial association is built, you may start weaning off the food and eventually you will have a dog who consistently performs even without any food in sight. The key here is in not weaning off too early. If you start weaning off before the foundation is built, you run a risk of the dog learning to ignore you when you don't have food in your hands. Also, you have to remember to reward your dog occasionally, if not with food, then use something the dog finds rewarding. In time to come, you may find that the dog has found the opportunity to train rewarding in itself! Ask yourself why people gamble or even get addicted to gambling when they only win once in a thousand bets. That is because winning is such a reinforcing reward that you do not need to reinforce every single time once they learn that it works eventually.

 

Positive training is all about love and praise.

Love and praise are results of positive training, but positive training is about doing what works best. Why use aversives to train when there is a much easier and better method out there? Positive reinforcement is not a new theory, and has been put into place for the past 60 years or so to train animals like dolphins, parrots, chickens, horses, cats and goldfish; animals who will simply swim, run or fly away when an aversive is applied. It allows you to train any animal without the need for yelling or even touching them. So why not do what works and have fun at the same time?

 

Lessons are only about having fun.

Lessons are a lot about having fun; fun with your dog, fun with your family and fun with new found friends. Why would that be a bad thing? Lessons are unfortunately also a lot of work. New theories and concepts being introduced, problem solving, teaching your dog new commands, working with distractions, making sure you do your homework and so on. Of course there are people who just wants to have fun, but for those of you who are serious about learning, it is the best environment to work in.

 

How can you discipline without punishment?

The biggest misconception about positive training is that we do not discipline our dogs. We do punish the dogs, just that we do so by taking away access to something they want, instead of inflicting pain or fear. Some people may question the reliability in that method, after all wouldn't pain and fear be a more powerful punishment if we want the dog to obey? Say you are trying to stop your dog's embarrassing barking at the dog park; once he barks, you pick him up, stop all play and fun, and head straight back home. Is removing his freedom and fun a much greater punishment than giving him a leash correction on the spot? Just remember that as the owners you control the most powerful resources and there is no need to rely on inflicting pain or fear to get obedience. Also, this method of punishment also do not carry side effects if implemented wrongly on a dog, wheareas physical corrections may result in other problems when not done correctly or done on a dog that has issues to begin with.

 

Positive training doesn't work.

That is like saying traditional training doesn't work, which is simply untrue as well. As long as a method produces results as we can testify for many many times, it works. It is the choice of methods that owners have to worry about.

 

Not one method works on all dogs.

Not one method might work on all dogs, but a theory is tried and tested to work all the time on all things, just like the theory of gravity. Positive training is based on scientific reasonings that has been around for a long time and works on all animals ranging from humans, to zebras, to rabbits and even goldfish.

 

Positive methods will never work in obedience competitions.

These people will beg to differ - click here to see some people who have been awarded competition titles with their dogs positively trained using clickers as a tool. Obedience competitions require a lot more than just obedience, they also require patience and repetition, which is why a typical dog owner will not be keen on doing competition style obedience. There is simply no need for a regular pet dog to do scent discrimination or close heeling. You set the rules for your own dog, not the competitions.

 

You need fear and pain to teach a dog to obey or else.

The typical scenario drawn up is when the dog is running in front of a speeding car and you are unable to call the dog back because you don't have food in your pockets to bribe the dog.

 

Positive training takes a long time to work and is a slow process.

Without you personally manhandling the dog into position, and by getting the dog to learn by itself without force or compulsion, the initial steps to building a behavior might take some time. However, the trade off is that the dog remembers better and you can pick up the training anyday. By not letting the dog discover what you want and simply be put into position actually takes the dog longer to learn. Imagine holding a child's hand to do his homework for him. He might learn in the process but the faster way for him to learn is by having him do it himself. Beware of shortcuts or so-called instant results because no learning might have occured or the results do not stick with the dog for life.

 

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