Dog Discipline - Hitting, Spanking, Slapping, Beating a Dog

Hitting, spanking, slapping, and beating a dog is sometimes used as a form of dog discipline or dog punishment.

After all, biting a dog's ear worked for Cuba Gooding Jr. in the movie Snow Dogs. Will such pain based dog discipline techniques work for you too? To answer this question, we must consider how dogs learn.

Dogs learn through conditioning; they repeat behaviors that get them good results and stop behaviors that get them bad results. Based on this, there are two schools of thought for stopping problem dog behaviors - reward obedience training and aversive obedience training.

Hitting, spanking, slapping, and beating a dog are all aversive techniques. Pain is delivered to sensitive areas of the dog such as his ear or muzzle, when he performs a bad behavior.

The argument for this type of dog discipline is that the pain will discourage the dog from repeating bad behaviors, because every time he does it, something bad (i.e. pain) happens to him.

A big problem with aversive training, however, is that it is too personal and there is no good way to redirect the punishment.

Your dog knows that the pain originates from you, and is not a natural result of his actions.

As a consequence, your dog may end up learning the wrong lessons, including:

• Hitting, slapping, and biting is a fun game that my owner plays with me. Let me try playing it with him and with others. Your dog may arrive at this conclusion when the hit/slap/spank is not delivered with enough force. Too much force, however, may result in fear dog aggression.
• My owner or a person's hand/face coming towards me is a bad thing. I should run away from people or bite the hand/face that is a threat to me.
• My owner or a person coming towards me means pain. I should stay away from people and keep them away by growling and biting.

If you do not deliver the pain consistently, with good timing, and with the proper force, your dog may get confused as to why he is getting disciplined. He may become fearful and stressed because he is unsure how he can stop the pain from recurring.

Hitting, spanking, slapping, and beating a dog may lead to even more behavioral issues including fear aggression as well as submissive urination.

For these reasons using physical techniques to discipline a dog is not very good dog kung fu.

If hitting, spanking, slapping, and beating a dog does not work, then how can we discipline our dogs and teach them right from wrong?

How can we get our dogs to behave and not engage in destructive behaviors?

The answer lies in the other school of dog discipline, namely reward techniques. Contrary to common belief, reward based dog discipline does not just involve giving food to your dog. Reward based dog discipline allows you to gain pack leadership through the control of resources.

You may not realize this, but you already control all of your dog's resources. For example, you decide when he gets to walk, when he gets to eat, what and how much he gets to eat, when he gets to play, what toys he gets to play with, when he has to go to sleep, what he can chew on, and much more. All you need to do is teach your dog this fact -

Your dog is NOT in control, YOU are.

For example, if you are feeding your dog, and he jumps on you or bites on your hand, you tell him that his behavior is unacceptable by using a non-mark (say No or ack ack). Then you ignore him and he does not get his food until he has calmed down and is behaving properly.

If he continues with his bad behavior, you say time-out and remove him to a time-out area. This teaches him that if he cannot behave around people, then he does not get to be with people.

You respond to all other bad behaviors in this same way - by restricting his access to his most desired resources and only giving him rewards when he has earned them through good behavior.

Different dog behavioral issues will involve different tactics, but the overall strategy is one of resource control and proper management.

It may, but it is not the most effective type of dog discipline.

There are many difficulties and risks that may cause your dog's behavior to degrade rather than improve. Using it to stop one problem dog behavior may inadvertently cause five other bad dog behaviors to come up.

In contrast, reward based dog discipline is safer because there is little danger of your dog becoming fearful, aggressive, or stressed. You are not delivering any pain to him, but simply withholding the rewards that he has failed to earned.

Reward based dog discipline encourages your dog to figure out how he can get on your good books because that is the quickest way to get his most desired resources. On the other hand, aversive dog discipline encourages your dog to avoid you because there may be pain involved.

Ultimately, reward based dog discipline allows you to forge a stronger bond with your dog, and helps make your dog into a confident canine who earns his own keep by following your directions.