My German shepherd was always very reactive while being walked and very, very stubborn. Plus, she didn't like other dogs. She liked every person she ever met, but zero dogs, so no dog parks for her. And she tried to chase cars.

My daughter never was able to handle her on a leash. I could, but only by being vigilant and seeing things before she did. She was like a rock rolling down a hill ... if I stopped her before she started, we were fine, but once she got started there was no stopping her.

Prong collars are actually less likely to do damage to a dog (choke collars are a danger to the trachea). Our first dog trainer called them "power steering" and recommended them over choke collars, pretty forcefully.

To Steve's point about shock collars, if the level is set properly, it's more of a startle effect than a painful shock. But even professionals have a hard time getting that right. We had to have a professional use one to give our Vizsla tennis ball aversion therapy (he'd swallow pieces of them). Afterwards, if he saw a tennis ball, he'd cower. If there was one in the car, he'd get as far away from it as possible. The trainer had the setting turned up too high.

quote:

Originally posted by ShiroKuro:

quote:

when I see a dog approaching, I tighten the leash and tense up, which communicates to the dog that we are now on High Alert

That makes so much sense!! Also, just more evidence of how attuned dogs are to their humans!

Completely off topic, but I’ve spent the last year working on the same exact thing - helping a high anxiety horse to not go over threshold by staying relaxed and present in the moment myself and it’s pretty amazing. It’s all about breathing and body language and really paying attention to the signals the animal is sending you all the time (and letting them know you hear them).

quote:

It’s all about breathing and body language and really paying attention to the signals the animal is sending you all the time (and letting them know you hear them).

Which also works with humans!

All creatures great and small...

Putting on my psychologist hat... positive reinforcement takes longer, but results last longer. Negative reinforcement is shorter, but results are shorter and may spawn unexpected side effects. You can get odd behavior with negative reinforcement, if something else happens in the environment coincidentally and somehow gets associated with the neg reinforcement.

Consistency is key during training. After the training is over, a random schedule of reinforcement is very effective at keeping the learning "locked in." But if they backslide, go back to consistent reinforcement again until the behavior is back to what you wanted.

As others have just mentioned, your body language is key, especially if your dog is a "pleaser." If you get angry or annoyed, your dog will notice. Some dogs (and most cats ) could care less, but some "pleaser" dogs will totally lose it if they think you're unhappy with them. If you and your dog are in an emotional state, it's hard to have an effective training session.

Cesar Milan (the dog whisperer, who I think has some really fantastic advice) talks a lot about teaching an anxious dog how to relax before he really starts training them to do anything else. Essentially what he's doing is unlinking the emotional response (anxiety, barking, lunging, snapping) from the next behavior (say, walking on a leash). Step 1 is deal with the emotional response and get the dog to be calm and/or submissive (to you). THEN start training to walk calmly on the leash.

Good luck!