A Boxer Needs Positive Reinforcement Training

A Boxer dog brings so much fun in the family. His love and faithfulness to his master makes him ultimate pet, if not to everyone, at least to his owner's point of view. Having a Boxer dog around, you ...

A Boxer dog brings so much fun in the family. His love and faithfulness to his master makes him ultimate pet, if not to everyone, at least to his owner's point of view. Having a Boxer dog around, you can somehow feel secure and not alone because this breed will definitely protect you as long as he knows you are part of his family.

These strong dogs, despite the capacity to work as guard dogs, service dogs, guide dogs, therapy dogs and police dogs, are amazingly very good with children. Families, even with children, need not doubt whether to choose this breed or not because they can be playmates at the same time protectors of your little one.

Aggression is not a big issue to this breed despite their distrust to strangers however, being headstrong is. Inappropriate obedience training often causes this issue. Dog trainers or handlers should know how to handle this strong and intelligent dogs so as to avoid problems such as this as well as other behavior problems.

Dogs do not figure out commands on their own. Despite of their intelligence, training is still necessary in order to come up with a nicely trained Boxer dog with human acceptable behavior and traits. However, some training techniques effective to other breeds may not always as effective to this breed, just like for example training based on corrections. This technique may have limited usefulness when used in training a Boxer dog. Most experts opt for positive reinforcement technique since Boxers respond better to it. Positive reinforcement is one of the four types of Operant conditioning. In this method, there is something that is being added to the situation to increase the chance of the behavior being exhibited again. Positive reinforcers can be anything your dog finds rewarding- these include food treats, favorite toy, a chance to play with his favorite game, interaction with other dogs and of course your attention, touch, stroke or hug.

When you are teaching your dog new trick or new command, he should be rewarded every time he does it correctly. When using food treat as a reward, better partner it with a praise in positive, happy tone of voice. Once your dog can already perform the command reliably, gradually decrease the reward until such time that you are only rewarding him occasionally with a treat or a toy, but with continued praise. Eventually, your dog will soon learn that if he keeps responding correctly, he will be rewarded with your praise and sometimes his favorite treat.

Article Tags: Positive Reinforcement