Is it Really Positive Training?: A Dog Expert Explains How to Tell

Thanks to Steven Appelbaum for this guest post. Mr. Appelbaum is the President of Animal Behavior College, the nation’s largest animal career vocational school that offers certified dog training, veterinary assistant, and dog grooming courses. He is a dog trainer, lecturer, writer, and educator with more than 35 years in the pet industry. He is currently being trained by his basset hound, Truffles.

For many decades, the most common methods used for training dogs were compulsion-based. This means that dogs were taught using force and/or to avoid some type of physical punishment.