Are Food Rewards A Good Idea For Dog Training ?

Using food rewards when training your dog has some very mixed ideas among dog owners.  Some people believe that it doesn’t work as your dog will only then obey commands when there are food rewards involved, while other people use food rewards and have been very successful.

Using food rewards will not necessarily result in your dog expecting to receive food every time that he obeys a command.  Food rewards will not make him obsessed with food either as long as you use food for a reward the correct way.

If you do reward your dog with food every single time that he obeys a command then he may come to expect it each time.  In which case, you may then have trouble trying to get him to obey you if you do not have food ready for him.

Food rewarding is a very effective way to train your dog but it is important to remember not to give the food reward every single time.  If he is not receiving food each time then he will not grow to expect it each time.

Let’s look at an example of teaching your dog the ‘sit’ command.  At first he will not know what the word ‘sit’ means and will have no idea what he is supposed to do.  So you give him the command ‘sit’ and as you do you gently press on his rump to encourage him to sit.  When he is in the sitting position you praise him and give him a food reward.

He is still learning so repeat this a few times so that he learns what is expected of him when you give the ‘sit’ command.  You may need to gently push on his rump for the first few times until he understands the command.  Each time for the first few times give him praise and a food rewards.  Then give the command again but next time, do not give him food, only give him praise.

Start the process again giving him a food reward for the first three or four times and then do it once again without the food reward and with just praise.  You can then start to mix it up a little so that he doesn’t know at which times he will receive the food reward.

By using this method your dog will not know when he will or will not receive food as his reward but he does understand that he receives it on some occasions and therefore he will want to obey your command just in case it is one such occasion. This way you are teaching your dog to obey the command with or without food.

As your dog learns the command and knows exactly what is expected of him you can start offering food less and praise only more.

Using food rewards for training your dog is very effective and probably one of the most effective methods of dog training, just as long as you don’t use the food every single time.

Dogs love to be praised and love to make their owners happy so he will be just as happy to obey your commands in exchange for lots of praise from you.