Why "No" is a pointless word

You can find an argument for and against every training method on the planet. Trust me, and if you don't, just google any training method you can think of. 

I've heard every argument about R+ only training and P+ only training. Sometimes they make sense and sometimes they don't. Currently, there's a blog circulating about how R+ training only could be the death of a perfectly normal dog. I completely disagree with this for many reasons. First of all, no where in R+ training does it say your dog cannot have boundaries or rules. The difference is we don't teach the boundaries with +P (E.G. shock collars, hitting, yelling no, prong collars, etc.). If an R+ trainer isn't teaching any boundaries than I think they fail at their job. Because their job is to train the dog, not allow it to run free with no rules. 

To completely explain how this should work I will start by explaining why "No" is a pointless word and actually hinders training. Let's begin with a few example scenarios.

One afternoon you decide to go into the kitchen and make yourself a sandwich. After making the sandwich you go into the living room, sit on the couch, flip on the tv and start to take a bite of your food. Suddenly, I rush into the room and shout a very forceful “No!” in your direction. You freeze, sandwich almost to your lips and stare. Now, can you tell me what you did wrong? It could be you aren't supposed to sit on the couch. Maybe you're not allowed to eat or perhaps watching TV is off limits. Maybe I'm yelling at you for the mess you left in the kitchen a few minutes earlier. Better still, maybe ALL of those things are wrong and you shouldn't be doing them. But it's doubtful that you're going to understand from my one word shout which of those things were wrong.

Let's try again, what if you were standing in the bedroom, singing, while looking out the window. I run in and shout “No!”. Which of these things are you in trouble for? Maybe you aren't allowed in the bedroom. I might consider singing bad or maybe you shouldn't be looking out the window. It could be you're not allowed to stand or shouldn't be standing on the carpet. But without more details you have no idea what to stop doing and what to do instead. So this scenario will need to happen many many more times for you to narrow down what you're being told “No” for. Because even if my “No” is timed perfectly, odds are you are doing more than one thing at a time.

Now let's put this example with a dog. I walk into the room to see my dog barking at the cat. He's standing there yipping his little brains out while the cat steadfastly ignores him. With each joyful bark he hops from the couch, to the floor, to something else. I walk into the room and yell at him. How is the dog to know whether his leaping, barking, harassing the cat or something else is the problem?

A few minutes later my yippy pup has moved to the window to bark at the mailman. Balanced on the back of the couch, staring out the window he alerts to the strange person at the door. Coming into the room and yelling could do several things. First, the dog may think I'm also yelling at the mailman (ever notice your dog getting more excited when you yell??). Or he could just be confused about what he should not be doing so he continues to act the same.

Over the course of time it's possible he may pick up from many scenarios that his barking is what he's in trouble for. In the mean time it's a very stressing experience for your dog to be yelled at or corrected without knowing for sure what the wrong behavior is. He may cower when you enter the room, but that's mostly out of confusion and him sensing your anger.

So what would be a better way of addressing the behavior? We will continue with barking as the problem behavior but other problem behaviors could be addressed similarly.

First of all, you need to step back and make sure you are addressing all of your dog's needs. Has he seen the vet lately? Is he getting adequate nutrition? Are you exercising him daily and enough for his energy level? Is he bored and needs more interactive toys? Making sure your dog is healthy, plus mentally and physically stimulated is a huge part of managing behavior. If your dog is lacking in any of these departments they will be prone to act out due to boredom, pent up energy or discomfort.

Now, what if you've checked all of that and still have a problem behavior? There's a few different approaches. One is to teach an incompatible behavior, but from my personal experience there's not much a dog can't do while barking. He can bark while sitting, standing, lying and some even do it while holding a ball!

Therefore, we need to teach the dog what we want them to do instead. Which, of course, is being silent. You can do this by simply waiting out the barking, then treating when they pause for a second (which I promise they will do!). Then add a word like “quiet,” wait for a second of silence then reward. It will take several repetitions but once your dog understands all you will need to do is say “quiet” when your dog is doing 16 different things and he will understand he needs to stop barking.

There is a huge range of things you can teach your dog to effectively communicate what you want from them. Teach your dog “off” to tell them to get off of people and furniture. Teach them “leave it” to tell them to not eat something. Train “out” so they know to leave a room when told. “Freeze or stop” to stop them from moving in a given direction. “Stay” works to keep them from getting into things as well. These cues are instructive and let your dog know what to do and what not do. Once taught they are more effective than yelling a meaningless word like “no.” It's far too general. Even if your dog learns that No means to stop barking how will they know it also means to stop jumping on Grandma, stop eating the trash, get off the couch, be quiet and get out of the nursery? Dogs do not generalize well and trying to use one word for everything compounds the problem.