It's me or the dog

July 13, 10:25 AMAtlanta Pet Services ExaminerBeate Spear

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A well behaved dog

Dog Trainers of Georgia, we believe it is vitally important for owners to give their dogs the opportunity and the tools they need to live successfully in a human world.  A dog that is given consistent guidance from an early age grows up to be a confident dog.  Education brings security, security brings confidence, and a confident dog has no need to show anxiety-based behaviors.

It has been proven by modern behavioral science that forceful handling such as physical punishment, leash yanking, excessive shouting or rolling a dog on its back in order to get it to submit is psychologically damaging. Instead, the most successful modern training theories suggest that reinforcing good behavior with rewards and marking bad behavior using vocal distractions or simply ignoring the dog is much more successful.  Positive reinforcement (i.e., giving the dog a reward in the form of praise, play, food, toys etc when it responds and offers an action or a behavior that you like) has been shown to be the most effective way to train a dog.  Ultimately, positive dog training results in dogs who have learned how to learn positively, while aversive training uses fear to combat fear, often resulting in a ‘quick fix’ that hasn’t truly identified and modified the root cause of the misbehavior.  As you begin the process of modifying your dog’s behavior, BE PATIENT – positive training relies on consistency, repetition and the following general rules: 
 

• Identify WHY is the dog doing what it is doing.  You cannot deal with a behavior unless you know the root cause.
• Once you know the WHY, then you can ask yourself HOW to treat the behavior.  It is vitally important that you understand your dog.
  
• Learn to talk and think dog.  Good communication serves to increase the bond between dog and owner considerably.
• Be Kind!  Never hit, scream at or yank your dog.  Don’t combat fear with more fear – recognize your dog’s concerns, then slowly and gently help him learn to overcome them.
• Go slowly and be patient. 

 

Teaching obedience commands is relatively easy to do, but changing a dog’s negative behaviors and perceptions is a lot harder.  Therefore it is important that you enlist the help of a qualified trainer to help you with a treatment plan that is designed for your dog’s particular problem.  Stay away from trainers that use harsh methods, choke, prong or weighted collars.  Remember positive training equals positive results.  It might take a little longer and require a bit more time and patience on your part, but the positive changes you’ll see in your dog are worth it.