Contrary to the common believe of so many owners out there, our beloved dogs are not human! It might be heart breaking to realize so but it would most definitely strengthen the relationship with our Fido. Dogs are great in observing even when we have no idea about it, we do send little cues and messages to our four-legged one, mostly through our body language. Based on that our dogs builds up a picture of us and his surroundings. Therefore that’s why it’s so important to be in peace with ourselves, before we could expect it from our dog!
Many of you probably heard about Pavlov and his conditioning experiments. Thanks to him and his work we have today a strong base for the dog training. In fact, that’s what all positive methods trainers are using in their work – classical and operant conditioning. Classical conditioning is responsible for involuntary responses, e.g. a dog salivating when food is served and can be used to associating unpleasant experience with something pleasant (for ex. if dog doesn’t like to have the collar put on, we give him favourite treats just after showing him the collar). Operant conditioning is responsible for voluntary responses, e.g. a dog sitting for a treat. These are the techniques we are using to shape the dogs behaviour to the one acceptable by us.