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Successful Training For Your Dog: The Positive Reinforcement Method
By doglover | February 7, 2010
It’s widely accepted among the vast majority of dog coaching specialists that the foremost effective and humane method to coach your dog is thru a method called positive reinforcement training. This is a fancy phrase for what’s primarily a terribly simple theory: using positive reinforcement entails rewarding the behavior that you wish to work out repeated, and ignoring the behavior that you simply don’t. This technique is in direct contrast to a number of the now-outdated but once-popular techniques for dog coaching, some of that were frankly abhorrent: physical pain and intimidation (like hanging an aggressive dog up by her collar), or inhumane strategies of aversion therapy (such as shock collars for barking).
Positive reinforcement works together with your dog. Her natural instinct is to please you – the theory of positive reinforcement acknowledges that lessons are additional meaningful for dogs, and have a tendency to “stick” a lot of, when a dog is ready to work out what you’re asking below her own steam (as opposed to, say, learning “down” by being forced repeatedly into a prone position, whereas the word “down” is repeated at intervals).
When you utilize positive reinforcement training, you’re permitting her the time and the opportunity to use her own brain. Some ways in which for you to facilitate the coaching method: – Use meaningful rewards. Dogs get bored pretty quickly with a routine pat on the pinnacle and a “sensible woman” (and, in fact, most dogs don’t even like being patted on the head – watch their expressions and spot how most will balk or back away when a hand descends towards their head).
To stay the standard of your dog’s learning at a high normal, use tempting incentives for sensible behavior. Food treats and physical affection are what dog trainers visit as “primary incentives” – in different words, they’re each vital rewards that most dogs respond powerfully and reliably to. – Use the correct timing.
When your dog obeys a command, you must mark the behavior that you just’re visiting reward so that, when she gets that treat in her mouth, she understands exactly what behavior it had been that earned her the reward. Some people use a clicker for this: a little metal sound-making device, that emits a definite “click” when pressed. The clicker is clicked at the exact moment that a dog performs the desired behavior (so, if asking a dog to sit down, you’d click the clicker just because the dog’s bottom hits the bottom).
You’ll conjointly use your voice to mark desired behavior: just saying “Yes!” in a very happy, excited tone of voice can work perfectly. Make positive that you simply give her the treat once the marker – and bear in mind to use the marker consistently. If you simply say “Yes!” or use the clicker typically, it won’t have any significance to your dog when you are doing do it; she desires the chance to find out what that marker suggests that (i.e., that she’s done one thing right whenever she hears the marker, and a treat can be forthcoming terribly shortly). Therefore be consistent with your marker. – Be consistent along with your training commands, too.
Once you’re teaching a dog a command, you need to decide ahead of your time on the verbal cue you’re going to be giving her, and then follow it. Therefore, when coaching your dog to not jump up on you, you wouldn’t ask her to “get off”, “get down”, and “stop jumping”, as a result of that may just confuse her; you’d pick one phrase, like “No jump”, and keep on with it. Even the smartest dogs don’t understand English – they have to be told, through consistent repetition, the actions related to a explicit phrase.
Her rate of obedience will be a lot of higher if you choose one particular phrase and use it each time you wish her to enact a bound behavior for you.
How to reward your dog meaningfully
All dogs have their favorite treats and preferred demonstrations of physical affection. Some dogs can do backflips for a dried liver snippet; alternative dogs just aren’t ‘chow hounds’ (massive eaters) and prefer to be rewarded through a game with a cherished toy, or through some physical affection from you. You’ll in all probability already have a truthful idea of how a lot of she enjoys being touched and played with – each dog includes a distinct level of energy and demonstrativeness, simply like humans do.
The most effective ways to stroke your dog: most dogs really like having the bottom of the tail (the lowest part of their back, just before the tail starts) scratched gently; having their chests rubbed or scratched (right between the forelegs) is sometimes a winner, too. You can conjointly target the ears: gently rub the ear flap between your thumb and finger, or scratch gently at the base. As way as food is worried, it’s not laborious to figure out what your dog likes: simply experiment with totally different food treats till you discover one that she very goes nuts for.
When it comes to food, trainers have noted an interesting factor: dogs truly respond most reliably to training commands once they receive treats sporadically, instead of predictably. Intermittent treating appears to stay dogs on their toes, and a lot of inquisitive about what might be on offer – it prevents them from growing uninterested in the food rewards, and from creating a acutely aware decision to forego a treat.
How to correct your dog meaningfully
The great factor regarding positive reinforcement coaching is that it doesn’t need you to do anything which may go against the grain. You won’t be known as upon to place any advanced, weighty correctional theories into observe, or be needed to undertake any harsh punitive measures. When it comes to positive reinforcement coaching, all you have to do is ignore the behavior that you just don’t wish to work out repeated. Not getting any attention (as a result of you’re deliberately ignoring her) is enough to make simply concerning any dog pretty miserable, and therefore may be a powerful correctional tool.
Contemporary belief in dog training states that we tend to should simply ignore incorrect responses to a coaching command – that, with no reinforcement from us (yes, even negative attention – like verbal corrections – counts as reinforcement: to some dogs, negative attention is better than no attention in the least), the dog will stop the behavior of her own accord.
The bigger the fuss you make over her when she does get it right, the clearer the connection will be between a particular behavior(s) eliciting no response in any respect, however other behaviors (the right response) eliciting massive amounts of positive attention from you.
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