How does a dog learn? By association. Dogs learn by the immediate result of their actions and the events that occur closely together in time, forming an association between the behavior and the consequence. Dogs will do whatever works: behavior is under the control of its consequences ( law of effect ).

A young puppy begins the learning process by exploring things in his environment. Whatever feels good to him, he will do again. Whatever doesn't, he will probably avoid repeating.

In the training and education process, dogs need strong motivators. Here are some rewards which are reinforcers for your dog: food, attention, initiation of play or fun activities, access to other dogs, toys/bones or other posessions, freedom, etc... Dogs are also highly motivated by avoiding "aversives" or undesirable consequences.

Many people are dissappointed when they discover the need for strong motivators to train their dogs. Somehow, they believe that their dog doesn't love them because if he did, "he would respond to my commands just because I ask him and after all, he is very smart!". Things are not as cut and dry as that. We must be ready to accept our dogs for who they are and love them for who they are. Yes they are very social and bond with us in a wonderful way. But, we cannot constantly attribute them human qualities. After all, they are still dogs, another species. They are valuable, fascinating, fun, innocently selfish, great learners, multi-talented, have great olfactory senses and we share with them an incredible bond of friendship and love. But since they are dogs, they do not think abstractly as people do. They do not speak our language but rather read our body language which they have learned to associate with certain events. However, we do have the ability of communicating with them, through "calming signals". And, we can educate and train them, through positive reinforcement incorporating elements of operant and classical conditionning. That being said, we must find a way through all these methods, to be the best we can be with and to our dogs. They are truly amazing and they teach us so much. I just know you all know what I mean by that!

So how can you best train and educate your dog? Positive reinforcement. What's one of the best tools to teach it? The clicker. Dogs see things this way: What's in it for me?