Dog Training Article: Using Physical Punishments in Training Your Dog

What I am calling a physical punishment refers to something a person would do in response to their dog misbehaving that the dog finds unpleasant or scary. It could include a loud noise, a shock or tightening a choke collar. Punishing a dog physically has some risk and is almost never necessary. One of the main reasons that punishments are risky is because they can cause fear, and fear is a major cause of aggression and shyness.

If you choose to use a physical punishment, you should seriously consider seeking the help of an experienced professional trainer who can coach you on your timing and application. However, I predict that the more you concentrate on preventing your dog's misbehavior and rewarding good behavior, the less you will be tempted to use physical punishments since you will no longer need them!

Using punishment correctly is not simple and mistakes can have serious consequences. I have outlined the some of the requirements for effective use of punishment:

• The punishment should follow the “crime” by less than 5 seconds so that your dog will not be confused about what behavior is being punished.

• The punishment should be just the right severity to reduce the misbehavior in 2-3 applications. If the punishment is too weak, it could make your dog less sensitive to punishments in the future, and if it is too harsh it could traumatize or physically harm your dog. If a punishment is too strong, his resulting fear could lead to another behavior problem.

• Your dog should not be able to tell that a person is punishing him. Otherwise he may learn to misbehave when no one is looking, or he may decide that people are unpleasant or scary to be around. The punishment should appear to come directly from the universe like gravity. A good example is a booby trap.

• Your dog should be taught a new behavior to replace the misbehavior. For example, teach him to “sit” instead of jumping up to get attention. If your dog has no alternate behavior for the one that was punished then he may get confused about what he is supposed to do in that situation. In his confusion, he may choose another misbehavior or become stressed and worried.

• Be aware that punishment if used for aggressive behaviors can be very dangerous. For example, if your dog growls at your daughter and you punish him by yelling at him and shaking him, he may stop growling at your daughter when you are near and the problem may seem solved. However, your dog is likely now even less comfortable around your daughter and the risk of a bite without a warning growl is higher.

Some examples of poorly applied physical punishments and possible consequences:

• “Rubbing your dog’s nose in it” - This technique is generally applied too long after a housetraining accident and so he will not associate the accident with the punishment. It could make your dog afraid of you, or he may learn that he needs to hide from you to poop.

• Yelling at a barking dog - This could increase barking if the cause of the barking is to get attention. It could cause him to fear the person who is yelling or it could convince him that what he was barking at was truly important since his person is “barking” too.

• Jerking the leash when the dog pulls – This is usually not a strong enough punishment to deter pulling for long. Leash jerks can also be damaging to your dog’s neck and spine.

• Kneeing a dog that jumps up – This may teach the dog that people are unpleasant or he if he enjoys being rough he may learn to jump more aggressively.

Training your dog properly using punishments can be risky and difficult! Therefore, we recommend choosing a punishment that has the leak likely-hood of doing harm such as a hand clap or "time out", preventing misbehavior while you are still training and most importantly, teaching your dog what you want him to do using rewards.