Poll: Is hitting your pet the right way to punish it?

[Tsaba]

grab the dog by the throat and force it on its back and don't let go until it calms down and understands it is to be in the submissive position, that is proper corrective training for a dog, they are a pack animal and understand who is to be in charge if you let them know, other wise, abuse won't work accept make it afraid of people.

 

[Keepitclean]

When my dog acts up I give him a swift hit. Though, no where near enpugh to cause any kind of lasting pain eg. bruising. When he is barking at an innapropriate time I just tell him to shut up and he does.

As people have said earlier in the thread, dogs are like children and you should treat them accordingly. When they do what they are supposed to give them praise and should you need to punish them be firm but fair. You don't need to beat something within an inch of it's life before it realises that it did the wrong thing.

 

[YoUnG205]

Depends how hard and where you hit; for example we give our dog a medium power slap on the backside if if shits in the house or raids the bin. I don't think that, that is cruelty it is just dicsiplin.
[sub] I know that I can't spell[/sub]

 

[DeadMix]

You've probably already heard this every which way and back at this point, but I'd just like to make sure.

You're brother is a terrible, and terribly stupid person. A quick google search gives you good, solid ways to teach dogs. What a dumb, cruel, lazy POS.

 

[Arkley]

I'm surprised this thread has gone on for as long as it has, when the answer is quite simple, if long-winded in explanation. While it is certainly not okay to beat your pet or hit it repeatedly, firm but reasonable physical discouragement is the most effective way to teach your pet not to do something. This, of course, has to go hand-in-hand with reward based encouragement for good behaviour and obedience, or it just won't work.

What people often don't understand is how to go about discouraging a pet, and the reason for this is that they don't understand how difficult it is for a house pet, even the more intelligent breeds of dog, to make a connection between an event and its result. If your dog savages your mail and you hit him for it hours later, the animal will not understand why you are hitting it. Even if you show him the mail, he won't get it. You need to act quickly, within a few seconds. Give the animal a firm swat on the nose or behind, and say "No". The animal will associate its recent behaviour and the word "No" with its punishment. It will be discouraged from repeating this behaviour, and you can discourage it in the future simply by saying "No", without the need for physical discouragement.

A dog's inability to make connections between punishments and not-so-recent actions is why kennels and pounds will usually tell you not to punish your pet at all if it has behaved destructively in your absence. If you do, even if you take the dog back to the scene of its misbehaviour, the dog will associate the punishment with your return, NOT its behaviour. This can be very damaging to a pet, not to mention your relationship to it.

People who often punish a dog's destructive behaviour too late will notice the dog behaving sheepishly upon their return, such as lying down or hiding its face, and mistakenly believe that the animal "knows it has done something wrong", and will punish it for its disobedience. This is not the case - the animal has begun to associate punishment with its owner's return, and is attempting to show subservience to appease its owner. Punishing an animal in this state can have dreadful effects, and for this reason I would strongly discourage anyone reading this from ever hitting an animal that is behaving meekly. Simply put, it is afraid of you, and that is never a good thing.

With this in mind, you can (and should) gently discourage your dog from bad behaviour with a firm tap on the nose, so long as you act quickly. And don't forget to reward it with treats for good behaviour and obedience, either.

 

[Fidelias]

um.... beating animals is a bad way to train them. They don't understand our human minds so they wouldn't understand why we were doing it, so they wouldn't learn anything. The beating of animals is what leads to them becoming vicious, untamed beasts, and mauling people. Ok, so that's a little dramatic, but you get my point. Basically, it's bad.

 

[the_bearpelt]

I would say that the way your brother goes about it is completely wrong.
The way to answer your question, tho, is to say that there are different types of hitting. There's the tap, the light swat, the smack, and then you get into official beating.
I think even going up to a smack can, in specific situations, be permittable. Our dog used to bite and we finally smacked the top of his muzzle. It shocked him but didn't really hurt him. That was pretty much how he stopped biting.
A light swat and a tap is basically hitting, but it's not really the same thing.
A REAL hit, when the animal can be actually hurt instead of just surprised, is wrong. At that level, I classify it more as a beating rather than a hit.

 

[twasdfzxcv]

So hitting animals makes one a bad person, but belittling animals' obvious abilities to reason and think is totally fine eh.

HAHAHA, it's as if you think I stand over my pet shouting "YOU'RE NOTHING YOU MISERABLE LITTLE TWIT! YOU'VE GOT NO REASONING POWER AND YOU STINK, TOO!"

Bwahaha, go away little troll.

And for the record, the message you sent me produced below:
"Are you just trying to argue or do you really think I meant something malicious? Fact is, animals make no connection between physical punishment and negative reinforcement. Any animal trainer will tell you that. You really, REALLY need to stop thinking I meant anything more than that. I didn't say I thought animals are stupid, but if you think their brains work the same way ours do, you are being naive."

First of all, physical punishment works and has its place in animal training, and negative reinforcement works, and you should ditch those trainers who tell you no physical punishment ever works. If you have any evidence that negative reinforcement doesn't work, please do share with us since I'm sure it would contribute a lot to this particular thread. Second of all, I'm accusing you for being arrogant, but I guess you just won't get it unless someone points it out directly for you. And lastly, please don't just tried to evade the argument in the thread and try to shut people up by sending message directly.

 

[chaos order]

Hitting an animal is cruel, that's all there is to it. You have to train them the way you would a child.

so by hitting them?

i joke i joke (not entirely sometimes a kid needs a good slap), i have a cat and i do occasionally poke him if he does something stupid, like jump onto and my shoulders when i walk by him(it freaking hurts!)

 

[lacktheknack]

NEVAR.

Your pet will NEVER - EVER make the connection between the assault and the "crime" - it'll only decide that you're a cruel person and shy away from you.

The proper way to punish a pet is to catch him in the act, then make a very loud sound or put him in a kennel.

 

[crazyfoxdemon]

I'd say it depends on the circumstances... When we were training my old dog, we used to smack it on the butt with a rolled up newspaper every time it use the house as its bathroom... Suffice to say, it doesn't do that anymore...

 

[Aureli]

Why don't you beat him and see how he likes it? Seriously, all you need to snap a dog out of bad behavior is a small physical correction and a loud noise. Repeat it every time they do what you want to correct, and they will connect the correction with the behavior.

 

[Viking Incognito]

If you use something like a rolled up news paper then it would be okay. But just straight up punching the hell out of it is legally considered animal abuse.

 

[shticks]

First time i saw my step dad spank a dog..... i thought that the was weirdest shit. Up until that point in my life the thought of striking an animal had never crossed my mind....

I mean Ducks, of course.... but you could never shoot that damned dog.

 

[Aureli]

logically don't do it on a rotweiler unless you have a strong desire to have your throat torn out

Umm No. Rottweilers are not a naturally violent breed. That has to be trained into them, just like any other dog.

Spoiler: does this look like the face of a dog who would rip your throat out with little to no provocation?

 

[newfiegirl 110]

My dog is pretty spoiled, but when she gets in trouble, the punishment varies. If it was something minor, she has a time out in another room away from us (she hates that). If the infraction was severe (ie nipping) she gets a smack on the hindquarters and then banished for half an hour. Seems to work pretty well.

 

[Lucifron]

It depends entirely on the dog and the circumstance. If your Chihuahua is angered you might want to consider another method than striking it, but if your Doberman is having a shitfit you do yourself a huge disservice if you don't smack it. In fact, I know of a Doberman who is a little messed up, and it was a real demon when it was younger. It would bite, show its teeth, be aggressive, tackle family-members, constantly disobey etc... The owners were forced to hit it, even one time strangling it with its leash until it nearly passed out. Today, it's the coolest and most loyal dog you'll ever meet.

 

[crudus]

It looks like I've won this time around as my parents agree with me, but what do you think, Escapist? How did you train your pets?

I personally think your brother should be committed but that is a different matter. Hitting your pet does nothing but break ribs unless you actually catch them doing something. Your pet won't associate action with consequence if the consequence happens even more than a second after the action. Even if you manage to get some positive punishment[footnote]No it does not mean the punishment is good. It means you added a stimulus to discourage a behavior[/footnote] in there at the right time it is still cruel. Next time you see your brother doing something you don't want him to, wait an hour and just deck him in his face so he gets some perspective in the mind of a dog.

I normally try to get mine to listen to me with treats. That seems to work occasionally.

Yes, because your dog can understand English.