Trained Dogs Rock
Bad Behavior, fix it with Positive Motivation
Dogs are similar to people in that they will occasionally cross the barrier of bad behavior in the pursuance of pleasure. Let’s face it, look at a time in your life when you did exactly the same thing. Perhaps you took something that didn’t belong to you, or knew you were doing something wrong and continued to do it anyway. Dogs are no different. If your dog decided to make a toilet out of your home during only one particular occasion, that can be forgivable. Maybe he was seriously upset, or just feeling sick! But if this becomes a regular occurrence, then it is time to either work the problem yourself or enlist the services of a professional.
One thing is for sure – bad behavior should never be encouraged. The easiest way to go about doing this is to create a system of motivation that shapes or distracts him away from the behavior by giving him something of value. This kind of positive motivation is so much more effective than many of the old-school methods that required hours and hours of scolding and bulling. There’s plenty of scientific evidence showing that incorporating fear is one of the worst ways to eliminate bad behaviors.
Regardless of what breed your pet dog is, you have to remember that every dog on the planet has “pack mentality” hard-coded into its genes. It’s essential that you understand this because once you’re pet gets settled into believing that they are the leader, bad behaviors will quickly start to follow. It’s never too late to repair such canine attitudes even if they have already arisen. Proper training is the first step in your quest to fix his issues.
Dog obedience training is not merely necessary to make your dog more responsive, or to show off his talents, the gift of training provides him the ability to feel secure and to develop a more balanced and stable temperament.
This feeling of security can only come through the use of positive motivation reward based training. In time you will have a very faithful companion that rarely loses control.
Keep in mind that all dogs have some sort of baggage (just like people. We all have our own issues) and to remove some poor behavior might be an easy fix, and done in a couple of training sessions. But to completely remove serious behavior issues, (i.e. aggression) will take more than just attending a couple dog obedience classes.
In any case, positive motivation training classes cover more areas than simply teaching how to train your dog to sit and stay. With the right Instructor (see other posts on this site about finding your Trainer) he/she can provide you with valuable exercises to take home with you, enabling you to replace his poor behavior with proper control. And with that, you are rewarded with a balanced and better-behaved dog.
