| Sorry, should've explained better. It would sound like an oxymoron if you didn't study behavior. :) Positive means "to apply" and negative means " to take away". Punishment is to make the probability of the behavior decrease. So positive punishment would be to apply something (an aversive like force) to decrease the probability of a behavior. Sorry for the jargon.
Actually I feel that as long as you are in control of what's motivating the dog then you can shape very detailed behaviors, very quickly, and keep the dog happy. That is, if you have what they want! I teach all the fine points to position with positive reinforcement but if my dog is at an advanced level and happens to look away when he's supposed to give me attention because the guy jumping up and down is more interesting then you better believe I'm popping him. or at least giving him verbal reprimand if that's all that it takes to bring him back. And even then I'm just trying to give him an appropriate level of correction to get him to stop doing it so i might start a little light but if it doesn't work then I'm getting a bit harder.
People that spend time forcing every little detail on a competition dog spend a good amount of time trying to put the drive back in the dog aka minimizing the fear in the exercise by remotivating them.  |