What is balanced training?
Exactly what it sounds like – a balanced approach to training and modifying behavior in your dog.
Basic learning theory involves four quadrants; positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement, positive punishment and negative punishment.
Simply put: when a dog does something good, it is rewarded by having something positive given or something negative removed, but when a dog does something undesirable, something negative is added or something positive removed. This involves teaching a dog that actions have consequences and the right choices equal good things!
In the same way you tell a child “don’t do that”, we have to communicate with a dog. How? Through equipment such as a training collar like a prong collar or choke chain.
How do dogs communicate? Usually in a way that us humans would think is fairly violent. Just watch an episode of Animal Planet or Nat Geo. Dogs don’t hand another dog a cookie to ask another dog to stop a behavior. They usually bare teeth, growl, lunge and even put their mouths on each other.
Balanced trainers succeed where other types of training fail because they speak dog the way dogs do; act appropriately and get rewards, act out and get consequences and the consequences are provided using equipment that mimics the ways dogs correct each other making it highly effective and easily understood by your dog.
There are a few things that all balanced trainers have in common, one being that we understand that at some point, every dog will need a correction, just like every dog will need praise and reinforcement. The key is to use an appropriate level of correction or praise for your particular dog at the appropriate times to communicate clearly which behaviors you want and which you don't.
