Are you using your dog's name the best
and smartest ways you can? In this video I'm going to show you four things you
need to think about when using your dog's name. Ian here or Simpawtico Dog Training and
before we get into using your dog's name please make sure you're subscribed so you
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that YouTube description for notes, links, and resources about the stuff we talked
about. Now dogs don't understand the concept of names like we do. They're
pretty good at memorizing sounds and chains of sounds and then assigning
meanings to them. So, they can learn to recognize words and phrases even though
they don't process language. On average a dog can learn about 165 words and even
up to 300 in some cases. One of the primary aims of training is to teach our
dogs the meanings of words. With practice they learn to respond in a particular
way to a particular sound. Among the most important sounds a dog needs to
recognize is their name. So let's take a look at some strategies to help you get
the most bang out of your dog's name. First, don't use your dog's name as part
of a correction or a reprimand. Dogs are really, really responsive to classical
conditioning. For this reason you have to be careful what you're teaching. You
always want your dog to have a good, favorable association with their name.
Every time you say it, it should be accompanied by good emotions in that
dog's brain. This is a conditioned emotional response and I've mentioned
that concept before on this channel. Yelling their name or hissing it with
exasperation and frustration will only pair bad emotions with it. From there
reliability will start to erode. This is an important consideration when training
Come, for example. When I say my dog's name I want them to look at me because
they have good expectations about what I want. I don't want them to pretend they
don't hear me because they're avoiding me. Many people in fact actually use
their dogs named as the reprimand. [dog bark] Leo! This is bad news because over time you
are teaching your dog to believe hearing their name means they're in
trouble. These folks then often wonder why the
dog won't come when called and generally won't listen. Using their name as part of
reprimand, or as the reprimand, is a huge contributing factor to not listening.
Remember: you're correcting the behavior, not the dog as an individual, so address
the behavior you don't like without having to make it
personal. When you need to follow up, or stop them from doing something, or
communicate that you're not happy there's usually no need to even use your
dog's name unless it's an emergency, we'll get to that in a minute.
Use interrupts like, "Enough!" or "Leave it!" or "Drop it!" or even just "Hey hey hey!"
These rarely need to be preceded by the name. Instructive reprimands and specific
redirects don't need the name either. The dog's name should only be used to: 1)
proceed requests and 2) get their attention in emergencies. We humans make
a lot of mistakes so say your dog's name nicely, always. Even when you're mad. And
since we know they're making associations use your dog's name to do
fun things together, or to reward them, or when you're praising them. Pairing their
name with lavish praise, using it as a precursor to good things and as a
gateway to important requests will be creating a conditioned emotional
response in these cases - and wiring that brain to love hearing their name. As
I said in the Positive Training Trifecta video we are always classically
conditioning our dogs, so don't waste the opportunity! The second thing to
remember: don't nag them with it. When you want your dog's attention, stop repeating
it ad nauseam. "Leo. Leo. No Leo. Leo. Please, Leo. Leo. Leo. Leo. Come
on Leo. Leo. Leo." When you do this you're denaturing their name so that it
becomes meaningless background noise. You're teaching them to ignore it which
is going to give you trouble down the road. I always work with my students to
help them get their dogs to respond to things the first time we ask for
behaviors like Sit, Come, Down, Leave it, etc. On this same token your dog should
look at you right away when you say their name. If you're having trouble
getting your dog's attention then the solution is not to just nag them and
hope they remember you're there. The solution is to go back to the drawing
board and do attention and focus exercises, and have more bonding
experiences. In the meantime monotonous repetition of their name didn't work the
first hundred times you tried, it so stop doing that and do something else!
You can also use your dog's name as part of a coding system. We can code the
requests we make and assign importance based on how we use our dog's name.
Dogs learn their names but most dogs have several familiar names or nicknames.
Dogs are also capable of responding to these. So we code requests and assign
importance according to what name we use. If we use one of their nicknames, this
tells your dog that the following request is a suggestion.
We'd like for them to do it but if they don't want to it's not a big deal. If we
use their formal name we're telling them that the following request is not
optional. We need them to do it immediately or we will follow up. This
will help you share some control with your dog and help them understand more
when you need something done now. Sharing control has been proven time and again
in not just animal psychology and behavior but in parenting, schools, and
the workplace. Do we really need to micromanage every single aspect of their
lives? Listen: not every request you make to
your dog has to be an order. They're not robots. Some things are just suggestions.
We do this all the time with the humans in our lives. Wife: "Hey honey, come sit down and
watch the show with us." Husband: "I really want to finish this thing in the garage first."
Can you imagine how silly it would be if we followed up on everything like it was
life or death? Husband: "I really want to finish this thing in the garage first." Wife: "I said
SIT DOWN!!" Think also of a mother—maybe even your
mom—mothers do this kind of coding all the time depending on the name they use.
Mome: "Hey Kenz, will you give me the dog treats please?" Child: "Sure mommy." Mom: "Mackenzie. Stop feeding the dog." "Mackenzie Megan you stop hitting your sister!" Our dogs our family and I'm betting you have a truckload of nicknames for your
dogs too, so use them as part of your management. This will help you decide
from moment to moment how much energy you can and should expend on management,
and save you some headaches down the road. Of course the most important factor
to making this work is consistency and common sense. Don't make a big deal out
of every single little daily thing around the house, and don't give a
must-do command unless you are willing and able to follow up. And you may have a
repertoire of commands that are only given when it's a must-do situation.
These are things like emergency stops, or distance downs, or even a heel. Likewise
don't use these unless it's really important. Coding can also help you
differentiate requests amongst more than one dog. Ian: "Dexter, come here. Yes! Good boy. Darwin, come here. Yes! Good boys! Oh, you guys are so good! Ok let's go!" And finally, train urgency with
reward scaling. Sometimes we're in emergency situations, like if the dog is
about to do something dangerous. In these instances we will not be able to help
ourselves. We will yell. We will shout their names.
However this needs to indicate that this situation is urgent, not that they are in
trouble. We can teach that using reward scaling and practice. When I get louder I
want a dog to think, "Oh man this must be important!" I don't want a dog to think
they're in trouble which is going to make them hesitate and possibly make the
wrong decision. So for example you could practice calling your dog's name for
attention and scale up the reward the louder you get. Kibble for tone neutral,
treats for calling loudly, a jackpot for shouting, and then a $10,000 jackpot for
outright yelling. Your dog will think, "Hey it's kind of spooky that you yelled at
me, but the buffet was awesome so, I'm alright with it!" Then the next time you
yell when they squirt out the front door they'll pay way better attention. I
talked about this concept in the Reward Scaling video and I'll put a link to
that one in the description. So let's recap guys. Don't use your dog's name as
a reprimand, or even as part of one. Use your dog's name a lot during fun activities
and during praise. Don't nag your dog with their name. Actually just stop
nagging altogether. Code requests with either their formal name or their
nickname depending on how important it is. Use your dog's name to differentiate
amongst several dogs. Teach your dog that volume equals urgency with a reward
scaling exercise. Being cognizant of how these little things make a big
difference is a tremendous tool in training your dog to be happy, healthy,
and well behaved. Think about how you use your dog's name, and nicknames, and start
implementing these strategies in your daily life. So questions for you: what are
some of the things you discovered about your training in this video? And what are
some changes you're going to make? Also what questions do you have about using
your dog's name? Let me hear about it in the comments. Don't forget to thumbs up
this video if you learned something and as always keep learning, keep practicing
and we'll see you next time. Thanks for watching!
