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What Is Punishment?
Punishment is not ideal, but it does have a place in training!
Introduction - Read This First!
Punishment is anything that a dog DOESN’T LIKE. In training, punishments are sometimes used to keep dogs from doing bad things. In general this is NOT a good way to teach your dog to behave, learn basic obedience, or do fun tricks. Punishment does have it’s place, but you have to use it VERY carefully and ALWAYS use positive reinforcement first.
Appropriate Types Of Punishment
There are a few situations where using a light punishment, like a stern voice, is OK. We’re going to explain when and how to do it right, so you can keep having a fun, positive relationship with your dog. RBut always remember this basic rule of training:
Pro Trainer Principles:
Never Use Punishment As The First Option For Training
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ALWAYS Use Positive Reinforcement First
Using positive reinforcement first to teach your dog new things is much less stressful on them. You can only even think about using light punishments once they know the behavior you actually want them to do. If your dog hasn’t been taught with positive reinforcement first, being punished for something they don’t understand will be very stressful! This can damage your relationship and cause your dog to totally shut down.
Punishment Example: Time Out and Taking Away Good Things
Overview
The easiest and most effective way to "punish" your dog is the one should use the most often. If your dog starts doing something bad, you must make sure to stop all good things that can be rewarding the bad behavior. This means stopping food, treats, giving them attention, or even not coming in the room if they're barking. Here are some examples:
Put Them In Another Room
This is the best way to put your dog in time-out. Remember to never use their crate for time-out. That should be a happy place! We’ll talk more about this in the lesson ALL ABOUT CRATES.
Pro Trainer Principles:
The Crate Is Always A Happy Place, Never A Time Out!
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Only Use The Crate For Happy Things, Never Punishment
Many training methods rely on using your dogs crate for management, which means that it needs to be a very positive place where they will want to spend their time. You should spend a lot of effort showing your dog that the crate is a relaxing and very nice place to go. You can do this by training with treats, feeding their meals in the crate, and giving them chews that they only get when they’re in the crate.
For example in potty training we will use the crate because your dog will automatically not want to pee in it. It really is like their own room within your house. So never use the crate as a time-out or do anything mean when they’re inside it!
Interrupt Playing
When your dog is learning how to play with other dogs you may have to jump in sometimes if someone is being too rough or rude. Usually dogs will sort this out themselves with a little growl or snap, and that’s appropriate! But if someone is being too rude and not taking the hint, you may have to step in and enforce good manners if the other dogs aren’t doing it themselves. .
Stop Treats
This is a very important way to communicate how commands like “stay” and “sit to get attention” work, because your dog will get treats the whole time they’re doing something good, and the treats will stop as soon as they do something bad.
Turn Around And Walk Away
This one works exactly the same as stopping treats for bad behaviors, except instead of stopping the treat reward, you’ll stop giving your dog the attention that was the reward!
Scolding and Other "Mean" Punishments
Overview
These types of verbal punishments are the only types you should ever use. They may be a little mean, but if you use these combined with a lot of positive reinforcement, they can be very effective. We will not encourage anything more severe than the punishments listed here.
Pro Trainer Principles:
Never Use Punishment As The First Option For Training
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ALWAYS Use Positive Reinforcement First
Using positive reinforcement first to teach your dog new things is much less stressful on them. You can only even think about using light punishments once they know the behavior you actually want them to do. If your dog hasn’t been taught with positive reinforcement first, being punished for something they don’t understand will be very stressful! This can damage your relationship and cause your dog to totally shut down.
Loud "No" Or "Hey" To Startle
This can be used to to let your dog know when they are dong something right at that moment. You must use it quickly to stop them from something bad they might be doing and redirect to do something good instead
Loud Clap
Pretty much the same as the loud “HEY” we talked about before. This one loud clap can be used to startle your dog to stop whatever they’re doing before you redirect them to do something better.
Here is an example of using a loud noise to show a puppy that we don’t want him on the couch. It’s important to know that he was first taught the command OFF so that he would understand what to do when he was scolded.
Light Tug On The Leash
Most of the time when your dog is on the leash, this is all the punishment you need to let them know to not pull you. Combined with lots of treats and positive, silly voice, and you’ll have a very polite dog on leash.
What Types of Punishment Are NOT OK?
Overview
While a little bit of aversive punishment in the right way is very useful, especially when you combine it with lots of positivity, these types of punishment should never be used.
Hitting Your Dog
Absolutely never do this. It will destroy your dogs trust in you and ruin your relationship.
Jerking The Leash Very Hard
If you watch the lessons on leash walking, there will be tiny “tugs” on the leash with your wrist when your dog tries to pull you around. But you should never jerk the leash with your whole arm. It will hurt your dogs neck and will not teach them anything.
Punishments Way Too Late
Dogs have a very bad sense of time, so when you do use any of the appropriate punishments, they must happen immediately when your dog is doing something bad. Even if you miss it by 10 seconds, you can’t punish them because they won’t understand what they’re being punished for!
When Is It OK To Use A Light Punishment?
Punishments should NEVER be your first option when trying to teach your dog something new. You should always try to teach your dog with positive reinforcement first, because this will teach your dog what you want them to do. Only then you can use a little bit of punishment (mean voice) when they do something bad. This approach is much less stressful for them!
Pro Trainer Principles:
Punishment Rule: 20 Positive Reinforcements For Every 1 Punishment
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Teach with MOSTLY Positive Reinforcement
Punishments can be very helpful in telling your dog when they did something bad, but they have to understand how to do it RIGHT first! So, make sure you teach your dog what you want them to do INSTEAD first, using positive reinforcement. Once they know what to do, THEN you can use some light punishments. We recommend trying to keep a 20:1 ratio of reinforcement: punishment, but this is just a recommendation. Every dog and owner is unique, but just be aware if you’re using too much punishment if it means your dog doesn’t actually know what you want.
What Happens When Owners Use Too Much Punishment?
Punishments are used to shut down whatever a dog was doing at that moment. If you use too many punishments, then your dog will shut down all their behaviors and not do anything. They will look and act very sad and may sit around and do nothing. This might look like a “well-behaved dog” but it’s not! There’s a big difference between a dog that was trained with positive methods and one that was yelled at too much and is afraid to do anything.
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