When people talk about punishment in dog training, often they mean what is technically known as positive punishment. Positive punishment means adding something to make the likelihood of a behaviour go down, such as using leash jerks, alpha rolls, or hitting the dog.
6 Examples of Positive Punishment in Practice
Yelling at a child for bad behavior. Forcing them to do an unpleasant task when they misbehave. Adding chores and responsibilities when he fails to follow the rules. Assigning students who forget to turn in their assignment extra work.
Positive Reinforcement (+R): If you want your dog to repeat a behavior more frequently, reward that behavior in some way. Negative Punishment (-P): If you want your dog to repeat a behavior less frequently, remove any reward or perceived award for the behavior.
Yelling, spanking, and even aggressive handling can mentally damage your dog and doesn't yield good behavior. In short, any sort of negative reinforcement on your pet doesn't work whatsoever. In fact, you might actually be causing further problems for them.
Positive reinforcement training uses a reward (treats, praise, toys, anything the dog finds rewarding) for desired behaviors. Because the reward makes them more likely to repeat the behavior, positive reinforcement is one of your most powerful tools for shaping or changing your dog's behavior.
Training a pet to behave can be challenging, but don't let the project get the best of you. A new study has found that yelling at your dog, and using other kinds of “aversive training” — like negative reinforcement — “can have long-term negative effects on your dog's mental state,” according to Science Alert.
Do dogs understand why they are being punished? Unlike humans, dogs do not always understand why they're being punished or the consequence of their actions. So depending on how you punish, it could cause a lot of problems such as fear, aggression and sadness in your dog.
1. Calmly remove your dog from the situation. No scolding, no yelling, and no physical punishment. Gently take hold of her collar, lead her to a quiet room away from the action, and leave her there with a bowl of water and a chew toy.
Physical punishment should never be a course of action following a puppy or dog bite. Tapping or popping them on the nose can be misunderstood and seen as being playful. This could also encourage more unwanted biting behavior. Hitting a dog, or being too rough with a dog, frequently encourages more biting as well.
When done correctly and when combined with proactive training, ignoring unwanted behavior can work. However, the time it takes depends on your dog's reinforcement history and their own personal enjoyment of the behavior. For some dogs, they get through an extinction burst quickly, while others can take quite a while.
While it might seem counterintuitive, ignoring your dog can sometimes work as a useful training tool. The idea is that when you react to an unwanted behavior, you are actually rewarding the behavior. So ignoring behavior is particularly helpful when what the dog seeks is your attention.
When training a dog to sit, the negative reinforcement method involves pushing down on the dog's rump until they're sitting. At that point the hand is removed, and the dog is happy not to be held down anymore. If they get up again, the trainer pushes their bottom down again, and releases it when the pup sits again.
An example of positive punishment is scolding a student to get the student to stop texting in class. In this case, a stimulus (the reprimand) is added in order to decrease the behavior (texting in class). In negative punishment , you remove a pleasant stimulus to decrease a behavior.
Consistency is the key to effective positive punishment.
Studies have shown that positive punishment is only effective if it is consistent. This means that the same consequence should apply each time the negative behavior is displayed. A lack of consistency will make the punishment less effective.
There are five main underlying justifications of criminal punishment considered briefly here: retribution; incapacitation; deterrence; rehabilitation and reparation.
However, unlike humans, dogs do not understand the consequences of their actions, so regular punishment will be no good. Instead, you have to use negative punishment and positive reinforcement to help stop undesirable behavior.
When we say a dog looks guilty, we usually mean he displays some or all of the following behaviors or signs: Tucked tail. Visible whites of the eyes. Cowering, hunched posture.
Memory Span
Dogs have a very short short-term memory. "Dogs forget an event within two minutes," reported National Geographic, citing a 2014 study performed on various animals from rats to bees.
As any pet parent with a high-energy pup knows, active dogs need lots of exercise. You might think physical exercise is the only way to release your dog's extra energy. Walking, jogging, or playing with an active pup is a great place to start.
Instead of your dog doing his own thing, he will be watching you and focused on you and what you want him to do. With The Dog Calming Code in place and a solid relationship set up, you'll find your dog is LISTENING to you, wanting to FOLLOW your lead and TAKE DIRECTION.