Dominance, Punishment, and Corrections… Oh My!

I recently watched a Facebook reel (video) of someone claiming to be a “positive reinforcement trainer” using the dog’s leash or head halter to pull the dog quickly, in order to get their attention and correct or deter the dog from jumping on an approaching person.
Is that actually positive reinforcement? Nope.
Did it work? Yes, it did. But not in the way you think.

Using corrections or punishment to stop an unwanted behaviour works, it’s true, and it works quickly (which is why it makes for such good tv on dog training shows, or content for social media). And it seems easy enough, right?

Kind of like when we were kids and we did something wrong, maybe we got spanked so we didn’t do it again… it worked, but it also taught us not to trust the person who spanked us, and it likely affected our relationship. (I don’t know about you, but it also made me learn how to be more sneaky and secretive.)
Did the punisher spank with the best of intentions? Yes, of course they did! They just wanted to teach us right from wrong, and that was the way they knew how.  But, like I’ve mentioned before, when you know better, you do better.

Just like we’ve learned that children learn better when we show them appropriate behaviours rather than when we spank them to discipline, we have also learned that dogs learn better when they’re taught what do to instead of being punished for what not to do.

Instead of correcting your dog, learn more about your dog. Learn why your dog is jumping on people, or why they’re barking at the mail carrier, or whatever they’re doing that you want to stop. Learn your dogs motivation and then use that motivation to change their behaviour in a positive way.

To be blunt: Your dog is a captive animal. Captive in the best of ways; ways that ensure they are always fed, warm, and loved… but captive animals all the same. They are canines who have to learn how to live in a human world. We choose to keep them as our pets, so it’s up to us to teach them how to live with us in the most mutually beneficial way.
Sure, it’s easy to correct or punish a dog so they don’t continue to do certain things, but that behaviour will likely just come out in other ways… often times, harsher ways. Wouldn’t it make more sense to teach them what we want them to do instead of correcting them after they’ve done something? It does to them!

Imagine this:

Your dog sees another dog or human and gets excited to go meet them, so they start running towards them, resulting in pulling on their end of the leash towards the other dog or person. 

So you pull on the leash quickly, to bring them closer to you, grab their attention, and keep them from running towards the other dog or jumping on the human they want to say hi to.
Or maybe you use an ecollar and give the dog a little vibration (or more, if they don’t listen).
Maybe your dog wears a prong collar so you give that a little quick tug. 

Your dog stops moving away from you and moves closer to you so that the discomfort stops.
There! Ta-Ta! You’ve stopped the problem!!

To you, a human, that’s the logical connection… But is that what the dog puts together?

Let’s look at it from your dog’s point of view:
“Fido” saw a dog/human and wanted to go meet them + they experienced discomfort or even pain from a pop of the a leash/head halter, vibration, shock, or pinch of the collar = seeing a dog/human means something bad will happen to them.

This often leads to bigger reactions next time, except instead of wanting to meet the other dog/human, your dog wants to hurt them before he or she gets hurt… or worse. What if your dog has no reaction, so that other dog or human comes closer to you. That seems like a win, right? But your dog is not actually calm, they are watching, waiting for the correction to happen, knowing that if they move towards the incoming visitor, something will happen that feels really uncomfortable or even painful. So instead of moving towards the other dog or human, they freeze, unable to show their excitement or fear of getting hurt.
That means there is no longer a warning… and as soon as the visitor gets too close, your dog reacts… maybe even bites, because they’ve already associated other humans and dogs as something that creates discomfort or pain and they want to stop it before it happens.
Does that sound like something you’d like for your dog, or the incoming visitor?

Me either…

What if, instead, you know your dog so well that you can read their body language and know when they need more space? What if you were able to use that space to keep them under threshold *before they pull, lunge, or bark* to get your dogs attention away from the other dog/human? And then what if you reward them giving for giving their attention to YOU the instead of the other dog/human? Do you think that’s something they might want to do again the next time they see another dog or human?

Yeah, I think so too.

Because they can’t learn when they’re in “go mode”, and they can’t learn when they’re in “fear mode” (worried of getting hurt). But because they’re now calm and focused on you, you can teach them how you need them to behave so that the other dog or human and come say hello.

So instead of: other dog/human + correction + discomfort/pain = reactivity because seeing new people/dogs means bad things happen.
They recognize that: other dog/human + give MY human attention + receive reward = stay calm, new people/dogs means good things happen!

I could go on and on, but I tend to “put my money where my mouth is”, so to speak, so I will stop here and share some links to the scientific studies to prove what I’m saying.

Just know that you don’t need to hurt your dog, yank on their leash, or create discomfort for them in order to teach them how to live with us.

They’re not humans, but we can still show them the kindness, respect, and love we want to be shown when we’re learning something new.

Connection over Correction:
It make take more time,
it’s not flashy,
and it doesn’t make for good content,

but they’re worth it.