Has your dog ever bitten your favorite sandal? How often does your dog bite the postman or newspaper delivery guy? Has your dog ever refused to play cards no matter how often you sat him in a comfortable chair, put on a cool jacket, and put a full house set in his paw? Each of these scenarios, from the unexpected to the unrealistic, can be classified as “unwanted”. Ultimately, you have to train your dog to do what you think is "appropriate" behavior. To achieve this goal, you must understand the dog's decision-making process, assess why your dog made that choice, and train him to behave appropriately.
Step
Method 1 of 3: Assessing Causes of Behavioral Problems
Step 1. Determine the cause of your dog's behavior
Remember that dogs make all decisions based on their own interests. What do dogs gain from this behavior? Is your attention, good or bad? Will this be some kind of fun game for your dog? Once you've determined the cause of his behavior, you should understand how to change his behavior for the better.
Think broadly about your dog's behavioral problems. Chances are your dog is misbehaving for a number of reasons. You should consider several factors including their diet and the frequency with which your dog is exercising or confined to a room or crate
Step 2. Watch your behavior
Do you jump on the dog's back and yell at him or force him to stop? Maybe that's what dogs expect of you. Even anger is a form of attention. Your dog is hungry for attention and wants to be part of the herd. If you pay attention or notice its presence only when the dog is naughty, you are responsible for “training” it to be a naughty dog.
Step 3. Pay attention to the dog's environment
Is there something particularly tempting around your dog? You may have to investigate, or maybe it's all clear! If your dog bites the sandal, get rid of the sandal. If your dog is always barking at people walking outside, block his vision. Help your dog to successfully eliminate his bad behavior. When your dog behaves appropriately, you can reward him. Without triggers, your dog will behave better.
Step 4. Consider your dog's diet
Was there a pattern in the onset of his bad behavior that coincided with a change in his diet? Just as children can have intolerances to certain foods or additives, dogs can also have intolerances to ingredients or preservatives in food, and it is shown through their bad behavior or hyperactivity. If you suspect this is the cause, do a detox and you can either get his diet back to normal or give him a plain diet (chicken and rice) for a few weeks and see if his behavior improves.
Method 2 of 3: Fixing Behavior Problems
Step 1. Do not punish your dog physically
If you've punished your dog more than three times for the same behavior, it means that your punishment is not appropriate. Remember, insanity means repeating the same thing over and over and expecting different results! Punishing a dog can hurt your relationship and possibly make matters worse. Punishing a dog doesn't have to be physical. Look for alternatives that don't hurt or frighten the dog. Do not hit or hurt the dog. If you do, you'll end up educating him to be a fierce and timid dog, instead of being cute and adorable.
Never hit a dog. Instead, just ban the dog strictly. Your dog will associate his behavior with your actions to stop him
Step 2. Get rid of physical stimulation
If there are certain objects, toys, and plants in your house or yard that seem to make your dog act, get rid of them. Give him a toy he likes so your dog can spend hours playing with it. Buy bones with raw skin, real bones, or chew toys that are safe for dogs. If there is a way to fill the toy with food, your dog will spend even more time trying to get the dog food out.
Step 3. Consider training your dog with a clicker
Practice with clickers is a method to quickly deliver compliments with the help of clickers. You can click faster than feeding or petting a dog's head, which is why training with clickers promotes good behavior fast enough for a dog to learn quickly. This method works by establishing a positive relationship between clicks and rewards. In the end, your dog will find the clicking sound a sufficient reward for his good behavior. You can apply these principles to make your dog obedient.
- Click the clicker, then give the dog food immediately. That will create a positive relationship between the food and the clicking sound. Then, a click sound will indicate an action as correct. So your dog knows that his behavior is correct.
- When your dog displays the behavior you want, click on it, then give it a treat. Once he's been performing the behavior consistently, you can assign a command name to the behavior. Start associating commands and behaviors with the help of a clicker.
- For example, before you teach your dog to "sit," make a click, give him food, and praise the dog when you find him sitting. When your dog starts to sit down for food, start saying "sit" to get the dog into position. Match it with a click to give it a gift. Eventually, your dog will understand that sitting down after being given the "sit" command will result in a click reward.
Step 4. Reward the dog's good behavior
When the dog behaves in your favor, such as lying down instead of barking, reward your dog. Your dog is more likely to repeat the behavior you want than to repeat the bad behavior. As the reward for bad behavior is withdrawn and the reward for good behavior continues, your dog will understand which response you want from him.
Step 5. Refine your behavior
Try to stop screaming, jumping, or responding in a way that makes your dog think you're excited, want to play, and focused on him. Even if you feel very upset, or even angry, your dog may mistake it for antics or an invitation for him to play. Resist temptation. Ignoring and remaining silent is better than screaming. Clean up the mess later after you've driven the dog somewhere first.
Step 6. Build trust
If your dog runs away from you and goes into hiding, you will have to work hard to rebuild the relationship with your broken dog. Your dog's trust in you has been broken and it will take consistency and positive behavioral reinforcement training from you to repair the broken relationship and turn it into something awesome.
Step 7. Be patient
Dogs are slow learners. Dogs do not have the same contemplative power as humans. Dogs cannot learn from one situation and apply it to another. It takes time and attention to fundamentally change a dog's behavior. If you've adopted an older dog and the dog has a behavior that seems irreversible, take it easy. This behavior can still be changed. Remember, the dog is very context dependent and that works for you. Now the dog has a new herd and home, and if you set boundaries and expectations right away when your dog gets home, the dog will learn quickly too. Sometimes when you're dealing with deeply rooted behavior like a herding dog herding the neighbor's children instead of sheep, you can't just train him to forget the behavior. It will be much easier to adjust the situation than it is to train him to forget the behavior.
How quickly the bad behavior stops depends on how deep-rooted the behavior is. Once the problem is deep-rooted, it is difficult to break the connection between the deed and the reward. In fact, in the short or medium term, the bad behavior may get worse as the dog tries harder to get the reward
Method 3 of 3: Understanding Your Dog's Heart
Step 1. Understand that dogs learn through a process of trial and error
Dogs do things because they expect a reward, whether it's food, playtime, or attention. When your dog misbehaves, look at what reward your dog got for the behavior and make sure your dog doesn't accept the reward again. Unfortunately, for the dog brain, attention is a huge addictive reward. That means yelling at the dog or telling him to leave will only promote bad behavior. Any action has the opportunity to give three kinds of results, namely good, uncertain, and bad.
- What matters is the dog's response to the results. Each result triggers a different response.
- A good result means the behavior is likely to be repeated.
- An uncertain outcome means the behavior is likely to be repeated or not.
- A poor outcome means the behavior is unlikely to be repeated.
- Now that you've realized that yelling and rewards are also rewards, the subject of responding to bad behavior becomes even more complicated. You're making the problem worse, not better.
Step 2. Understand that your dog makes a direct connection
Dogs live in the present. If your dog bites your favorite shoe and you don't punish it right away, it won't learn anything. If your mother comes home after that, finds a broken shoe, and slaps the dog, the dog will associate the punishment with the owner who just came home and slap him for no reason. Therefore, dogs become wary of their owners. The dog did not learn that shoe-biting is bad.
Often times, the punishment is not clearly understood by the dog. If you catch a dog nibbling on a shoe and immediately tell the dog to stop, the dog may still associate the punishment with the owner, rather than the crushed inanimate object
Step 3. Observe the dog's routine
Remember that dogs are creatures of habit. Determine if the dog is bored or anxious. Boredom and excess energy can turn a well-behaved dog into a naughty one. Make sure your dog gets enough exercise and enough opportunities to run and chase to drain his energy. It will make him feel satisfied and happy when he returns home and less likely to misbehave.
