What Is Positive Punishment in Dog Training?
Everything you need to know about the use of positive punishment in dog training. Photo: JJ Photographer/Shutterstock If you are a new dog owner, or even if you’ve been around dogs for a while, this article is for you. It covers the technical definition of positive punishment, examples of what it is, what we know about the risks of using it and what professional organizations advise. Let’s get the technical definition out of the way first. What is positive punishment in dog training? You’ll have noticed I said positive punishment instead of just punishment. In everyday language, we often say punishment when what we technically mean is positive punishment. We can also have negative punishment, but that will be the topic of another post. Punishment means something that reduces the likelihood of a behaviour happening again i.e. the behaviour goes down in frequency. And positive means that something is added. So positive punishment means adding something after the dog did a behaviour ...