Yesterday I missed posting! The past few weeks have been nutty, and this week it caught up with me. So I sincerely hope that everyone has been having a great week. I have some serious Facebook and Twitter catching up to do.
In the meantime, I’m going to be changing things up a little bit over here at Oh My Dog! While a lot of the content will stay the same – reviews, quotes and pictures, stories about Emmett and Lucas – I want to layer in community interaction content. Because holy cow. You guys are SMART. I pour over your blogs, read your tweets, check out your Facebook pages, and you are one amazing community of animal lovers, advocates, and experts.
So let’s pool our resources together.
Starting today, I’m going to toss out a Community Question on the first Friday of every month. (I know, I know. This is actually the second Friday of July, but I didn’t think of the idea in time for the first Friday!)
I would love for each and every one of you to weigh in on the question, and get a discussion going in the comments section. I think we can learn a lot from each other. And along those lines, if you have a question you’d like me to toss out, go ahead and send me an email, and I’ll get it scheduled!
For this Friday, here’s my question:
Is punishment ever appropriate or effective in training? I try to focus solely on positive, reward-based training, but when – if ever – is it okay to, say, squirt bottle your dog? Give a leash correction? A time out?
Discuss!
I think “punishment” needs to be viewed from the dog’s perspective. Using Lucas as an example, he HATES being wet, so when we were working on his leash aggression issues, treats didn’t always work. Squirting him on his feet (and his face when he went all nuts) usually redirected his attention and slowed some of him impulses. While I would have preferred to not have squirted water in his face, he quickly realized that behaving meant good food and a dry face. However, I think that leash correction, hitting, yelling, etc., are not effective and only teach fear. It’s really hard to truly what is a punishment for a dog sometimes. Great (and tough!) question, Maggie!
Love the idea of Friday question! I’m no expert at this, my spaniel-mix Kelly is pretty stubborn (read: Mom hasn’t been as consistent with Kelly as she should!) but I agree with using positive reinforcement. Can’t say it always works! Kelly loves to run in the yard and won’t always come when I call. Even when offered a treat, because running is more fun. But when I kneel down and pretend to be praising a good, obedient dog at my feet, Kelly comes running right up to me. There is no motivator greater than Mom’s love.
Thanks for your insight, Peggy! It’s interesting because Lucas is the same as Kelly… He’ll choose running over a treat any day! I guess the ultimate goal is to replace a negative response with a positive one, like you showering her with love. Where I struggle is with reactive behavior, like when Lucas lunges at a dog he’s afraid of to keep it away. While we’re struggling to build up the positive association, is okay to squirt him (like John’s comment below) when he aggresses?
I would say it has it’s place in certain circumstances. Unfortunately most negative reinforcement I see is useless because they don’t use a method or context that the dog understands. If you can use a negative reinforcement the dog understands spray bottle = wet and unpleasant, newspaper swat on table = loud and unpleasant, and pair it appropriately with a behavior; such as lunging at another dog, or counter surfing, it can work.
I have an Irish Wolfhound that I got at 16 months of age, so when I was leash training him the last thing I wanted to do was any kind of pulling or jerking on the leash. We would just end up in a pulling contest. So I worked with voice, and body to control him, and I thought ahead on our walks. I used a flexileash so he had time to think about the command before hitting the end of the leash. When I HAD to use the leash, I used quick jerks along with my voice, never pulling or giving him any excuse to brace against me. Now he is excellent on and off the leash, and the few times I have had to get his attention in a hurry (and he is ignoring my commands), a quick jerk, and he is immediately apologetic and comes right to heel. We have an agreement, he acts like a gentleman, and I treat him as one.
Mom beats me on a regular basis…so what do I know about positive reinforcement? BOL! Just kidding!
For the most part, pawsitive reinforcement works much better on me…however, Mom agrees with a few of the comments above. Sometimes I get so caught up in what I am doing that the only way to gain my attention back is a sharp noise, or snap of the leash. I that quickly gets my brain focused on Mom again…and that allows for the pawsitive reinforcements (a.k.a. COOKIES!) to remind me all about what happens when my behavior is good!
wags, wiggles & slobbers
Murphydog
Thanks for weighing in, Susan and Murphydog!
Susan, I absolutely love your “agreement” with Finn. I think that respect is such an important part of training, and it’s easy to forget that it’s a two-way street during training frustrations.
I guess what I’m taking away from this discussion is that a small amount of correction is acceptable and appropriate if the trust is already there, which I definitely think I have with Lucas. Our challenge, then, is to focus on counterconditioning his misbehavior so that we can phase out the squirt bottle!
I love the idea of the question of the week. I’m a dog trainer in Dallas and I focus on positive reinforcement. The rub is that you can’t give the positive reward without having their attention. That’s where the leash correction or spray bottle sometimes comes into play. It’s important to remember, however, that it isn’t the negative input of the spray or leash correction that trains them – it’s the praise in the space afterwards. Even a harsh voice tone can be considered “negative reinforcement” for some shy dogs. Just because you aren’t using a physical component doesn’t mean it automatically qualifies as being “positive only” training. I have a rescue dog who would DIE if I spoke to her in a harsh voice.
I’m a little late in answering. I rescued a dog that my mom now has because the dog did not get along with my other dog. This rescue has leash aggression and has an aggressive way of meeting other dogs in the dog parks. She bullies other dogs.
While I think it’s because she’s scared, treats do nothing when she has escalated. She is strong and escalates quickly. Relaxing the leash, confidence of the leash holder, etc. have not made much of a change. Changing directions is not always possible. There’s no way in heck that she would listen to a sit command.
A spritz from a water bottle totally redirects her focus and takes the wind out of her sails. It gives her enough time to refocus on something other than her drive. And, it works in the dog park, too, when she’s not on the leash.
Sometimes, the focus needs to be broken. I think doing it with a pain methods don’t usually do too much good, though, and often tend to cause flat out fear.
Nice blog!