Should you reward a dog for bad behavior?

I don’t use “no” as a punishment when my dog does something I don’t like but as an actual command for him to not do whatever he was doing. Because of this I often reward him after saying no. If he tries to go in the bathroom I tell him “no” firmly. And if he leaves I will reward him even just with a “good boy”. My current dog portrays a lot of fearful and submissive behaviors and used to more which is personally why I switched to the “no” then reward strategy, and R+ training. But how do I lay the ground work with a new puppy for a “no” command. Or at least how did you teach your puppy this with R+.

Most dog owners will have learned at puppy school that the best way to get a dog to do what you want them to do is to reward them with something that they want at the time they are demonstrating the desired behaviour. Anything that we reward and reinforce with a dog, makes it more likely to occur again in the future with more intensity and frequency. Whilst it is simple to remember to reward your dog when you are teaching it to sit, or drop or other obedience command, we tend to forget about rewarding and reinforcing their day to day good behaviour and unknowingly tend to reinforce unwanted behaviour. In training terms we call this Inadvertent Reinforcement. So, even if you are yelling at or telling the dog off when it is jumping up or barking, what are you actually giving to your dog, exactly what it wants – your attention, so you have actually given them a reward for this behaviour – a positive consequence. This then reinforces that bad behaviour in dogs… and so the problem begins. Reward the good behaviour, ignore the bad. We want to reward and reinforce the puppy for calm behaviour and teach it an alternative behaviour to jumping up in greeting or barking at the backdoor. Identifying the reason for bad behaviour in dogs is not always easy, but for many common problems it really does come down to how we respond to it and making sure we’re not unconsciously rewarding it.

Rewards aren’t just treats, rewards can be any food, praise, affection, toys, or anything your dog finds rewarding. Affection is a reward and all rewards tell your dog that yes, you like that behavior/state of mind and you’d like to see more of it. It’s really easy to accidentally reward your dog at the wrong moment and therefore reinforce the wrong behavior. For example, Sweetly telling your dog “it’s okay” and/or petting him while he’s afraid, Pulling your dog close to you and petting him while he’s growling at strangers, Petting a dog who jumps up on you. In all of these cases, we’re not trying to reward the bad behavior but that’s unfortunately what’s happening. Rewards, Behavior and Lifestyle A reward can also be an element of a dog’s lifestyle, like sleeping on the bed. Dogs with behavioral issues shouldn’t be allowed certain privileges such as sleeping on the bed. Instead, they should have more of a permission-based lifestyle where the dog needs permission to get on the couch, bed, etc. If your dog is doing well behaviorally, it’s okay to allow her to sleep in the bed, just make sure you remove privileges and go back to a more structured lifestyle if and when her behavioral issues pop up again.