Edward L. Thorndike (1874 – 1949), a member of the philosophy department at Harvard, made his mark by doing experiments with animals. His most famous experiments were those involving cats and dogs in trapped in puzzle boxes.
Out of these experiments, he proposed his Law of Effect: satisfying outcomes are more likely to be repeated, and unpleasant outcomes are more likely to be lessened or stopped.
Another was his Law Of Exercise: the more a skill is practiced, the better it becomes.
While these might seem obvious today, it was an important milestone in the field of psychology.
But there are often exceptions to everything. People don’t always stop doing things that are unpleasant, nor do they always do things that are pleasant. We don’t stop changing a baby’s poopy diaper (unpleasant). We don’t always drive our car as fast as we would like (pleasant). There are also situations that are not skills based that involve one time learning that don’t require multiple exposures or practice. Imprinting and abrupt trauma are examples.
Knowing when these principles apply to your dog training is important. Sometimes you want a one-time learning situation, and in others, you want to avoid that experience. Sometimes you want a dog to learn that it is pleasant to do this, and unpleasant to do that. And sometimes you need to keep practicing a skill to get it to the level of performance that is needed.
Plan accordingly.