Methodology:
How Will We Learn?

Absolutely! We can use either our voice or a clicker to mark when the dog earns a reward. Clickers require additional dexterity, but can send a clear message to the dog even in busy spaces.

Not at all! Humans work jobs with the expectation that they will be adequately compensated for their efforts. We trust our employers to pay us regularly, going home each day without demanding money before leaving. Without that trust, we might ask for payment before work, or at least to see it first - a major difference between rewarding and bribing!

This point is often where self-taught people go awry and is an essential part of my job throughout the coaching process. If I had a nickel for every time I reminded someone to keep their hands off the treats! Anyone can look up advice and videos on Reddit or Youtube, but my job as your trainer is to make sure you're properly practicing appropriate skills in a way your dog understands so they will work when you need them to.

While food is ideal for teaching new behaviors because of the easier reliability, and speed of its use, we ultimately diversify rewards to keep things fun and take advantage of everyday situations with our dogs! Sit/Stay might be taught with food, but once developed, will be used and rewarded naturally with greeting or going out for a walk - no food needed!

Training that incorporates punishment works on the same model of operant conditioning as positive reinforcement training, and absolutely works (by definition) to reduce behavior! However, there are many potential issues that may arise:

• These TV shows do not show the entire training process. They are cut and edited for viewership, and thus often skip over mistakes and steps that would make the audience cringe. True training takes time and effort, despite how easy these shows make it seem.

• Some behaviors we see as "being bad" in pet dogs are instinctual and come naturally, such as chewing and sniffing. Others were intentionally bred into certain dogs, like retrieving in Golden Retrievers and hunting small prey in Jack Russel Terriers. Because there is an inherent need to express these instincts, simply punishing the behavior is not enough without teaching a suitable alternative or providing an acceptable outlet.

• Some unwanted behaviors may be the result of fear, anxiety, or stress, such as lunging at dogs on leash or urination. Even if the behavior is reduced with punishment, the cause of the behavior has not been addressed and will likely find other ways to be expressed.

• R+ training incorporates a more comprehensive view of canine behavior that extends past behavior in specific situations. Thanks to research, we know that dogs experience emotions that heavily influence their behavior. We know that stress releases cortisol into the body, causing physiological changes and altering the dog's epigenetic expression.

• Punishing behaviors can prevent the dog from providing crucial information about their mental state, making it difficult to anticipate impending behavior in daily life. This might look like a dog that seems to suddenly bite out of nowhere, instead of growling or showing other signs prior.

• Effective traditional methods require precise timing for corrections, just as positive methods do for rewards. If someone incorrectly times a reward and no learning happens, the dog just got a treat and doesn't understand why. If someone incorrectly times a correction and no learning happens, the dog was just abused because they were physically or mentally harmed and no learning happened.

• Punishment-based methods give humans the tools to easily take out their frustration on their pet dogs. Animal abuse can be disguised and internally justified as "training" when we, the humans, are in a bad emotional state and not thinking clearly.

• Aversive methods can result in emotions and stress being transferred to other objects. A classic example is using a prong collar to prevent a dog from running to greet other dogs on the sidewalk. The behavior starts out with friendly intentions from the dog, but over time, they associate looking at or approaching another dog with pain and discomfort. The result is a leash-reactive dog that avoids greeting other dogs and lashes out when they get near. The training was successful and the dog no longer pulls to greet other dogs, but the training methods have left an even bigger problem that poses a safety risk.

We ask that you commit to learning training methods that don't incorporate aversive tools such as prong or e-collars while working with Fuzzles Dog Training. If continuing to use an aversive tool is the only way you can currently feel safe while walking your dog (particularly if there is a risk of being pulled down), that's fine - just know that we will not be incorporating the tool into our training practice.

Aversive tools can harm the relationship between dog and human, may create unintended side effects such as reactivity or emotional distress, are easily misused, and can become abusive in times when emotions run high. Most of all, they can lead to looking at behavior through a lens of convenience to humans, rather than truly understanding why it's happening. To put it another way, they run the risk of treating the symptom rather than the cause of a problem.