Timing While Training

[vpeewee]

I have a question that has been bugging me for a while, when does bad behaviour become good behaviour and how long does the dog need to recognise this?

Let me explain, when training our dog we have mostly been told to ignore 'bad behaviour', ie. barking, jumping etc and then reward the good behaviour. But how long does it take for the dog to recognise from bad to good behaviour?

For example, our dog barks when we go to the backdoor beucase he wants us to come outside (and he jumps on you when you open the door) so i stand at the door and wait until he sits (beucase he knows thats what he has to do), but how long does he have to hold the sit for before I open the door as the reward? Is waiting 2 seconds ok, 5 seconds? 10 second?

Another example, when he jumps on me I turn my back and ignore him, sometimes he jumps a bit more but then eventually he will sit down, how long should I wait before I turn around and give him attention?

I guess this goes with a lot of other training, so how long does a dog need to realise that he is being good? Does it depend on the breed or individual dogs?

What are your thoughts on this?

[jaybeece]

For example, our dog barks when we go to the backdoor beucase he wants us to come outside (and he jumps on you when you open the door) so i stand at the door and wait until he sits (beucase he knows thats what he has to do), but how long does he have to hold the sit for before I open the door as the reward? Is waiting 2 seconds ok, 5 seconds? 10 second?

I'd be a little concerned that the dog sees the barking as effective as he's seeing you respond (coming to the door and telling him to sit). I haven't had to deal with attention barking from a dog before, but I'd personally wait for silence from the dog (while you're inside the house), then open the door to ask for a sit for a few seconds and then let him in.

Otherwise you run the risk of him learning that barking = door open even if there is a sit in the middle of it.

Another example, when he jumps on me I turn my back and ignore him, sometimes he jumps a bit more but then eventually he will sit down, how long should I wait before I turn around and give him attention?

I always walk away, then come back a few minutes later and ask for a sit before he comes near me. Sitting dog gets attention, jumping dog gets zip.

I don't go by a certain amount of time as it really depends on the dog and the bad behaviour, instead I prefer to really make sure there's a decent seperation between good and bad. Bad behaviour gets absolutely no attention even if he amends it quickly- I don't want him to jump on me every day and then sit afterwards, he's not allowed to jump full stop.

I hope that makes some sense.

Edited December 3, 2007 by jaybeece

[Tonymc]

Vpeewee,a Dog does not make judgement on whether a behaviour is good or bad.He just does!!!!It is up to us to dictate what behaviours we want.A Dog will stop behaviour if its not making him feel good and vice versa.

Any dog training starts with immediate reward for the Dog when he responds how we want.We initially need to reward immeditately so the Dog connects the reward with the behaviour.For example a simple sit,when first taught the Dog is rewarded immeditately then as the behaviour becomes fixed we can alter the reward schedule.Meaning more time can pass before the reward.Then we can go to random rewards.

I would have a check on your leadership.You talk about an example of going to the door.Initially with a Pup or new Dog learning the Ropes, a short sit does the job.As it becomes clearer to the dog what we are asking of him,lengthen the Sit and vary the duration.I will maybe one day make him sit for a minute, then another day five minutes.

We cannot prescribe a magical number timewise that every Dog needs inorder to instill desired behaviour as dogs are individuals and every enviroment has its own variables.What we can do though is to take note of the results we are getting.

Like everything in life if we are not getting the results we want, we must change our approach till we do. Tony