Obedience Training

This article was submitted by Emmaline Duffy-Fallon, head trainer at Citizen Canine Ireland.

How do I get my dog to be obedient? This is a question I get asked every day from owners who are frustrated that their dogs display 'selective deafness' or appear to be 'wilful' or 'stubborn' when asked to perform a request by their owners.

It is very often the case that the owner has forgotten one very important rule - that behaviour is under the control of it's consequences - law of effect.

Think dog
When training a dog it's important to understand what governs what and how they learn. Obviously we would like our dogs to learn appropriate behaviours but they can easily learn inappropriate ones too. Here a couple of examples of how inappropriate behaviours are reinforced.

1. Dog scratches furiously at back door to be let in, owner complies and opens door = dog likely to do it again in the future.
2. Dog chases cat in back garden, cat flees=dog likely to do it again in the future.
3. Dog jumps on countertop, finds and consumes left over food=dog likely to do it again in the future.

In each of these scenarios the dog has been rewarded and therefore the behaviour lives on.

So here's what we know about all dogs - they do what works. They will not automatically switch to plan B if plan A has previously worked as a strategy.

The good news
At the end of the day, every dog owner has complete control in allowing their dog access to everything he wants or likes, be it food, water, attention, play opportunities, access to smells, toys, freedom to run off lead, greeting people and other dogs and access to outside and going for walks.

The trick is understanding this and exploiting it to our advantage. This means that you put and end to doling out everything your dog wants for free and instead have your dog perform what is being asked of him FIRST and then you provide your part of the bargain - giving him what he wants.

In a nut shell training your dog to be obedient is providing consequences to the dog at each and every opportunity. However, it is vital that you are prepared to withhold the reward if your dog is not compliant with your request.

There is one very important question to ask yourself when you are seeking to change your dog's behaviour.

Do I want more of it or less of it?

If you want more good behaviour the goal is to educate your dog as to how he should behave in order to get the things he wants. Reinforce the good behaviour. Reinforcement can take many shapes and does not consist merely of food rewards. Having said that I use food rewards initially when training a new behaviour. I then switch to intermittent food rewards when the behaviour is more fluent and looking more polished.

Here is a partial list of reinforcers for my own dog that are not food related.

Object/toys
Any type of ball (soccer ball, rubber ball, tennis ball, baseball, jolly ball, boomer ball, basketball), leads (a predictor of a walk), all types of tug toys (rubber and rope variety), floating kongs and classic kongs (retrieving fun), plush toys (retrieving + chewing fun), beer mats (catching and dissecting fun), squeaky toys (dissecting and retrieving fun), chuck it toy, empty plastic bottles, cardboard boxes (dissecting and investigation fun) and sticks (retrieving and chewing fun).

Activities
Fetch (see above), get into car, get out of car, go into the house, leave the house, visiting other people's houses, belly rubs, ear and back scratches, hugs, cuddling, wrestling, grooming, being bathed, play with cats, approaching and investigating livestock, swimming, chasing and catching Frisbee, jumping, playing with dog friends, meeting people (familiar and unfamiliar), finding objects (keys, remote, mobile phone, kong, balls), rolling in rotten smells, door opening opportunities, being let off lead, resting on the bed (mine and hers) resting and access onto the couch, putting on the lead, marking, investigating shopping bags, chasing the laser light, dribbling the football, greeting visitors, practicing obedience exercises and tricks, stalking pigeons, sniffing our pet chickens and lastly praise and attention from me.

The list could go on and on.

The secret to controlling your dog
Make a list of everything your dog likes (toys/food/activities) and abide by this next rule religiously.

For each item on the list your dog must be instructed to either sit/lay down/make eye contact with the owner or come when he's called. It's that simple. If you can (and are willing) to control your dog's universe you will get control of your dog. No magic, just training and contingencies at play here.

Getting rid of inappropriate behaviour
If you want less of a behaviour - stop rewarding it. We are all familiar with the term 'practice makes perfect'. If your dog is practicing an unwanted behaviour (see 'think dog' paragraph example 1+ 2) then manage the environment as best you can so that he is not getting reinforced when you are not present.

When you are present, however, you could also opt to choose a non-violent way of punishing your dog when he behaves inappropriately. Timeouts (often referred to as 'negative punishment') are an effective way to teach your dog that their behaviour is inappropriate and they will be punished as a result of performing that inappropriate behaviour. The resulting punishment takes the form of a social isolation penalty (see timeout article for more on this).

As a trainer who strives to use humane and non-violent methods to educate and train dogs I am not interested in pursuing other forms of traditional type training methods (lead corrections, squirting dogs with water) or equipment that is designed to purposefully hurt or deliver pain-inducing punishments.

Teaching a dog to behave appropriately in my opinion should be a fun endeavour for both owner and dog. With all the advances in dog training using a more positive and rewarding approach, educating your dog as to how to behave appropriately and respond to specific requests no longer has to be considered a chore.

Now that you understand how to motivate and train your dog, the question is, are you motivated enough to teach him?

© Emmaline Duffy-Fallon, Citizen Canine Ireland - www.citizencanineireland.com