Using Praise for Training Your Dog

Dogs must be trained right from when they are young. Different techniques are adopted by owners who use trainers nearest to their homes. Yet use of positive approach to training is vital. It helps the dog retain its vitality and teaches them discipline as well.

Relating to Dogs using Positive Approach

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Dogs relate to the man in a manner of kinship, they belong in an intricate and intuitive way because they have many qualities of man. However, they are pack animals and they have instincts of the wild too. Owners realize the importance of using positive reinforcement (treats and praise instead of punishments) to train their pets.

Tuning Learning Process Early

One realizes importance of obedience training only during the later stages of the life of the dog, in the way they readily respond to corrections, in the manner they find a pleasing approach without being told and the way a owner has to resort lesser and lesser to using his or her leash.

Needs of Pets Understanding Training methods

Pets have special needs that each owner must pay attention to always. The way they respond is determined by their surrounding conditions and their innate nature. Teaching must be oriented towards their understanding and adaptability; one must not force anything on them.
1) Classic approach
2) Operant method
3) Social responsive method
4) Non-associative learning

Associative methods versus rest

Animals create association between their environment and their feelings. A natural flow between action and reward, condition, and stimulus is present in all methods except in non-associative learning. The last case represents an action or impulse that does not give the actual anticipated response. Let us say a dog expects biscuits when it hears a whistle. Whistling repeatedly without giving biscuits will stop that dog responding to whistles. The above example demonstrates a useful method commonly used to remove automatic reactions that may remain from a previous training session.
In reward method, dog will run when you produce sound. Once you reward it, behavior becomes strong. This classical method used to train them finds a use for incorporating almost all behaviors that one wants in his or her dog and is a form of positive development where one does not punish or inflict negativism on their pets.

Social Behavior Discrepancies

Our expectations of our dog may be sky-high. We would expect our pet to be an epitome of perfection, to be very obedient, and to be charming in all aspects of their behavior. We do not expect them to dig holes in cushions or turn every backyard into a mess from hell. It is true, they will be everything you want them to be but they must undergo training.
Clicker training, electronic and relation-based training, dominance-based training and rival-based training are among widely followed approaches adopted for putting any wayward dog back on track.
a) Clicker
b) Electronic
c) Relationship
d) Dominance
e) Rival
f) Koehler
g) Motivation

External Stimulus versus Native Instinct

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Your pet may like to assert his individuality

The clicker is a sound-producing device that one time, to produce sound at the precise instant that the behavior manifests. Clicker may be a whistle or music played in the background. Once a behavior becomes set, one may decrease the use of sound or external stimulus.
In a relationship-based approach, communication and interpretation rest on actual implementation and principles of social behavior. It is similar to dominance-based actions that curb the natural instincts of the dog as a pack animal and turns its attention towards feelings of belonging within a team. These approaches place conditionality or a limit on the behavior of the dogs. Their behavior even when it is perfect will be lacking the spontaneity of those trained through positive reinforcement.
Koehler's method is the action memory dependence technique, meaning that once your dog does one action, it remembers, and then it either likes to do it or does not want to repeat that action depending on the conditioning. This does not reinforce positive behavior and soon it will lose its natural instincts to become a conditioned response animal that is more robotic in its movement.

Dependence of the pet on the Owner

Attitude of owner is this is my dog and he will listen to me. Of course, when it wants food it will listen, and then it will be back to its old tricks. Many areas exist in dog training that one must tackle differently. Pets largely follow their owners in social behavior. If you lead strongly in the direction it must take, it is simple to train your pet completely.

Right Conduct Always

Though they have different habits, it is easy to govern their behavior by stressing on importance of right conduct. If you use negative commands or punish your dog then it will turn its head away, and you will take a long time to bring it around to your line of thinking. Moreover, the negative impact will remain and the animal will develop some fear or chagrin in some situations.

Animals will be animals

Changing innate nature of animals is not easy. They will only change if one changes their innermost thoughts towards a correct direction, anything else will result in rebellion and unnecessary expenditure of effort. Some dogs will persist with their chewing or whining, digging up the backyard, or begging even after you show them how to behave.

Digging Whining Chewing Begging Aggression Social behavior

Most behavior is intrinsic to breed; one must choose the breed correctly first. However, one may correct most habits by use of alternatives. This unwanted behavior is an extension of the conditioning principle. It means associating the surrounding environment with the stimulus of change. Keep encouraging them to do everything right and reward them when they do it. This will help you develop a bond with your animal and the psychological impact will be positive too.

Change through Leadership

Your pet will obey the commands like stop, heel or sit if you lead it. This will turn whining or digging to an extent. One may have to use strong disincentives like dog feces to stop incessant digging or begging. One could also use lime peels or use sound to scare it when they do unpleasant things, but one must watch out for negative impact.

Retain the base Nature of your Pet

Barking or snapping is a display of aggression in dogs. This may have medical reasons or it may be inherent to the breed. Terriers may exhibit a higher tendency to show aggressive behavior. The underlying tendency of dogs is to develop a bond. By showing positive encouragement towards favorable behavior, it is possible to change their aggression so that dogs retain their natural aggressiveness and yet, are under control always.

Full reward for the Owner

One can see the rich dividends the pet owners realize by emphasizing the importance of positive reinforcement (treats and praise instead of punishment) over ordinary methods like leadership and incentive based training. One gets a dependable friend for life; one who does not wait for rewards or encouragement and that is wonderful.