Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 6-10 of 112
 Don't Shoot The Dog! June 21, 2008
SLM (East Coast, USA)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Fantastic. Reading this has helped me gain a bit of insight into relating better with our dog (and people too). For five years I have tried many things to aid in getting our dog to stop pulling while on leash. A Gentle Leader didn't work. A choke collar didn't work. I even resorted to using a Herm Sprenger prong collar, to no avail. After reading this, I realized I needed to "speak" a language my dog could understand. He pulls, I stop. He wants to walk, so he stops pulling. Our walks are quite lovely now, and I didn't need to buy an expensive training aid to accomplish that.
great information to change behaviors June 20, 2008
D. Wagner (Maryland US)
Works wonders for my dog, and I've noticed my boss uses these methods to get the best from me also (and I don't mind!).
 Don't Shoot The Dog by Karen Pryor June 12, 2008
Jerame J. Brown (Frankfort, KY)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Good book for dog training and behavior, however there are lessons that can apply to other aspects of life, including human interactions.
 Don't Shoot The Dog June 4, 2008
Sandra N. Lee (San Luis Obispo, CA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The author, Karen Pryor uses a psychological approach for shaping the behavior or dogs. The title of the book invokes humor in teaching and training behavior. Behavior modification techniques have been around for many years and still affect animal behavior when used appropriately.
It could be easier to find a particular behavior like "biting" if it were listed in the index, so there is room for improvement there. Otherwise, learning about behavior modification techniques is very valuable, not only with animals but also with humans.
 Oh no. Please, no. May 10, 2008
Snipe (Idaho)
3 out of 15 found this review helpful
Please, tell me the author is not so uneducated that she doesn't know the difference between a reinforcer and a punishment! Holy Toledo! On page one she says, "A reinforcer is anything that, occurring in conjunction with an act, tends to increase the probability that the act will occur again." OK, so far, so good.
But then she says on the same page, "A negative reinforcer is something the subject wants to avoid..." Uh, not true. You fail even my undergrad course on behavioral principles.
A negative reinforcer is STILL A REINFORCER! It still increases the chance of said act recurring. Ms. Pryor has made the same stupid mistake of thinking that "negative reinforcer" is the same as "punishment." No, no, no!
A negative reinforcer is taking away a noxious stimuli, not adding one. It's really a basic issue, and one that is SOOOOO misunderstood and wrongly stated in the popular press. The noxious sound of the buzzer ringing because you didn't put your seat belt on is ONLY a negative reinforcer if you find it reinforcing to have the sound stop. The stopping is the key, not the addition of the sound. We are talking + versus -, not a smiley face versus a frowny face. Please, correct this horrible error, Ms. Pryor!
I haven't gotten all the way through the book, but what I was hoping to be a pleasant adjunct to a class certainly can't be used as one given the flat-out wrong information in it. It may be good for dog training (and I hope it is), but when you see such an egregious mistake on the first page of text, it doesn't bode well.
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