Helen Taylor
Dog Training & Behaviour
BSc (hons) Zoology, ADipCBM,
Member APBC, Member APDT (881)

North Dorset-based behaviourist and trainer


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Why punishment and negative methods don't work..

Many owners almost instinctively use punishment and negative means to "train" their dogs in the belief that this will help to encourage the dog to follow commands, behave better or resolve behavioural problems. Any form of negative training method (ie that intended to stop a behaviour by using a negative consequence if that behaviour is expressed) does not work well as a training method and should be avoided if a happy, well-balanced, well-behaved dog is the goal. "Punishment" is defined as anything that is intended to makes a behaviour less likely to be repeated - reprimands, leash corrections, threats, hitting, "tapping" a dog's nose, jerking, poking, growling, yanking, using choke chains or slip leads. ALL forms of negative training share these downsides. However, the more abusive punishment methods - shouting, smacking, threatening, yanking etc - are the most likely to cause damage.

Below is a summary of the most important reasons why negative methods are not an effective or safe way to train dogs or solve behavioural problems.

1. Due to absence of language skills and the slightly different way that a dog's mind learns and forms associations, dogs often do not make correct association between deed and punishment and are likely to be confused as to why their owner has become "aggressive" - even if the reason for the punishment seems obvious to the owner. Worse still, dogs very often form a negative association with the wrong thing and thus may feel an increased fear (and therefore, potentially, aggression) towards that thing in future.
2. Most aggression has its roots in fear. Using methods that instil fear or anxiety, or inflict pain often result in some form of aggressive behaviour from the dog through fear. Aggression may or may not be directed to the source of the punishment, and is often directed to something the dog has learned to associate with the punishment, like the presence of another dog or a child, rather than with their "misdeed".
3. Using punishment or negative means almost always has negative impact on owner-dog relationship and the bond of trust. Sometimes this can be repaired by reversing these methods, but sometimes it cannot.
4. Human timing is usually not good enough - punishment usually arrives after dog has stopped exhibiting the behaviour.
5. Punishing a dog for exhibiting a behaviour does nothing to address its cause. If timing IS correct, it may occasionally cause a behaviour to be temporarily suppressed but, if the root cause has not been addressed, problems usually re-emerge - sometimes in another (often more serious) form.
6. Punishing or reprimanding a dog does nothing to show him what behaviour you DO want.
7. Dogs are not capable of complex emotions such as guilt. Owners that believe their dog "knows he has done wrong" are anthropomorphising heavily. A dog's apparent "guilty" look is merely a manifestation of the dog's anxiety in response to the owner's aggressive body language (or even a learned pattern that aggression often follows a certain behaviour), and an attempt to appease and prevent further aggression. A recent scientific study** showed that dogs are most likely to be assessed by the owners as looking "guilty" when the owner believed that they had committed the "crime" but when, in fact, they had not.
8. A dog that is always being "nagged" or scolded may simply learn to tune this out and will probably not try to please the owner.
9. Even when expertly administered (which it almost never is) punishment makes dogs unwilling to try behaviours - the behaviour that was the intended target may get temporarily suppressed, but so do many other behaviours (because the dog was upset by the unpleasant consequence and wants, at all costs, to avoid it in future). This makes training much harder in future as fewer behaviours are offered in any situation.
10. If a dog learns that he cannot trust his own owner, he is much more likely to be suspicious and afraid of other people.
11. Using punishing behaviour is rewarding to the punisher and punishers are likely to escalate punishments over time - leading to ever increasing chance of behaviour problems developing.
12. Punishing a dog for growling (which is a warning of further aggression if the warning is not heeded) or for showing other warning signs often leads to dogs skipping the warning step and going straight to overt aggression.
13. If the wrong behaviour is met by a negative response the dog will feel anxious (because, by nature, most dogs want to please). If this is done habitually, he may become frightened to try anything for fear of getting it wrong. In contrast, dogs that are trained using reward-based methods really want to get it right to earn a reward and will try hard to do so.
14. Dogs, like people learn and remember best when they are relaxed, confident and in the mood to learn. A dog that is anxious and confused is not a good pupil.
15. Dogs and people belong to different species. Although we may think we are emulating the behaviour of the pack leader, we do not "speak dog" and trying to speak a language we don't understand is very dangerous and our "words" can easily be misunderstood by the dog. There are far more effective ways of showing your dog that you are in control than "dominating" them.

Whether a dog is showing aggression, or simply not obeying his owner, there are much safer and more effective ways of dealing with problems than using punishment.

Example: hitting or shouting at a dog for attacking or lunging aggressively at another dog. Normally, the owner's aggression arrives after the dog has finished lunging at the other dog (because, while the aggression is actually being displayed, most owners are - quite rightly - preoccupied with ending the incident). Although the lesson the owner is trying to teach seems obvious to them, the most likely lesson the dog will learn is that the presence of another dog results in his owner getting aggressive. As the original cause of the dog's aggression (most commonly fear-related in the first place) has not been addressed, the dog now has even greater motivation to fear other dogs and try to keep them away, meaning that aggression is likely to increase, rather than decrease. Moreover, the dog now also trusts his owner less, as he will not understand why his owner suddenly became "aggressive" instead of protecting him from a perceived threat. As the punishment is not having the desired effect, the owner starts punishing more and more harshly in an attempt to "teach the dog a lesson", "show him who's boss" or simply to try and stop the behaviour.

References

*Emily J. Blackwell, Caroline Twells, Anne Seawright, Rachel A. Casey. The relationship between training methods and the occurrence of behavior problems, as reported by owners, in a population of domestic dogs Department of Clinical Veterinary Science, University of Bristol, United Kingdom.

*Meghan E. Herron, Frances S. Shofer, Ilana R. Reisner. Survey of the use and outcome of confrontational and non-confrontational training methods in client-owned dogs showing undesired behaviors Department of Clinical Studies, School of Veterinary Medicine, University of Pennsylvania.

**Horowitz, Alexandra (2009) "Disambiguating the "guilty look": Salient prompts to a familiar dog behaviour".Behavioural Processes, Volume 81, Issue 3, Pages 447-452.



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©Helen Taylor 2009

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