Dog Training Secret Tip #3: The Secret Of Compliance

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A point that I always stress when I am teaching someone how to train his or her dog is this: Training does not happen without motivation. You need to motivate your dog if you want him to perform.

I also stress the fact that there are two forms of motivation: Positive and Negative. Both forms of motivation can produce results.

For a long time dog trainers would not use food or other forms of positive motivation because they had the silly notion that a dog is supposed to work for its master, PERIOD.

So dog trainers of the past would put a choke chain on the dog and use negative motivation to get the dog to comply with the command. The pain motivated the dog. In order to escape the pain the dog would comply.

This is a very bad way to train.

Whenever a trainer uses negative motivation he will get side effects. A killer whale trainer once said: If you put a shock collar on a killer whale you will have a very short training session because there is a good chance that the whale will eat you when you get in the pool.

He went on to say that aggression is caused by negative training methods. I completely agree with him. At Alpha K9 Pet Services, you'll learn proven, positive methods to train.

We also stress that using food is only one part of the training process. We show you how to use what we call life rewards.

A life reward is anything that your dog likes or wants. Think of the last time someone demanded you do something.

How did you feel? I bet that Dog Training Secret #2 kicked in, remember opposition reflex? Now, think about the last time someone asked you to do something and rewarded you for doing it. How did you feel?

I bet that you like being rewarded more than forced. Here is a little exercise for you. Next time you need someone to do a little task for you, reward him or her.

Ask a spouse or child to do something for you. It could be anything and then reward the behavior. You will get better results with rewards than you will with force.

Here is the secret of compliance:

   1. Ask
   2. Motivate
   3. Reward

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