As a caveat, don’t get me wrong, there are many great trainers out there in both the Positive Reinforcement and Balanced spectrums. These are just generalizations.
Many dog owners start out in the “Positive Reinforcement” spectrum of dog training. Commonly, it’s about using treats, clickers, praise – everything is positive. No dog owner wants to be shown to be mean or cruel to the dog, and hey, it’s positive reinforcement, can’t be bad right?
Positive reinforcement is fractured, trainers are trying to one up each other to see who can be more positive. We see the attitudes “If you’re not doing things my way, then you have to be cruel in some way!”
When “positive reinforcement” fails, the only other training methodology that seems to exist is “balanced” training. Watch the training groups, so many owners are coming from the positive world because it didn’t work for whatever reason – now you’re heading to balanced where tool use has become so abundant.
Balanced training used to be about the outcome of the dog – a balanced dog. What is a balanced dog? In my opinion, balanced training has now become the path to obedience. Have an aggressive dog? Really doesn’t matter why the dog is showing aggression, this tool can fix it – e-collar, prong, whatever. Chances are good you’ll be using the tool for the life of the dog – no reason to stop using it right? This is the attitude that puts many dog owners into a control and management situation.
Read deeper. Read up on trainers postings – and you’ll learn a solid truth.
Obedience does NOT equate to well behaved.
Many trainers out there have very obedient dogs – but the tool(s) still exist in the dogs life “just in case” – the insurance policy. Look at my dog running around off leash! Yeah, but it still has the e-collar on. Take it off and show us how well trained your dog is. They won’t, they can’t – because they don’t trust the dog without it.
Robert Hynes Dog Training
Serving Edmonton, Alberta and surrounding areas.
admin@roberthynesdogtraining.com