Reactivity isn’t a training thing.

It isn’t a ‘bad dog thing’

It isn’t a ‘bad training’ thing

It isn’t a complicated thing.

Recipe for a Reactive Dog

• Lack of socializing and mental stimulation 2 – 12 weeks.
• Being taught to fear walking/people/dogs 8 – 20 weeks.
• Bad Genetics
• Bad Food
• Pain
• Environment

The problem with a reactive dog is that many dog trainers have tunnel vision. They look at only one aspect of the problem. They are so engrossed dealing with the symptoms that they totally ignore the problem.

To deal with a reactive or aggressive dog you need to look at the entire dog. Then you need to look at the world from the dog’s point of view.  There are a few things you can do if your dog is reactive or aggressive.

As a behavior consultant I see a wide variety of problems, but there are some a few common problems that result in reactive and aggressive dogs which have nothing to do with training.

#1: Medical Causes of Behavior Problems

Chiropractic

At least 20% of the clients I see whose dogs are suffering from canine reactivity or aggression are in pain. The most common pain is a disk out in the back, most often up by the shoulders or near the hips.  There are several ways to identify this as a problem. First, I suggest a canine Chiropractor.

A gait analysis is one way of identifying if there are structure problems. A canine massage therapist will also be able to identify problems.

Your dog doesn’t need to be an athlete to cause strain on the joints or back. The most common method of putting a dog’s back out is a) jumping off a bed or chair, and b) going up or down the stairs.

Diet

It can be difficult to determine whether a dog’s diet is sufficient. It doesn’t matter what the package says, if the dog is not absorbing nutrients out of the food then it can be depleted.  I’ve worked with many clients who had hair or blood tests done on their dogs, revealing a vitamin or mineral depletion. With behavior problems we most often look for a vitamin B deficiency.

I also suggest to anyone whose dog is suffering from behavior problems to stop giving their dog tap water. If you need to feed your dog tap water let it sit on the counter for at least one day, disturbing the top of the water every few hours. You can also run it through a water filter. Both of these will help dissipate the gas and chemicals in the water before feeding it to your dog.

Chemicals and Cleaners

There are ample research papers suggesting that our homes have become toxic. Everything from cleaners, air fresheners, scented products, phosphorous in laundry detergents, solvents in our dish washing liquids, dry ice in our meats, aerosol sprays, formaldehyde that leaches out of pillows and mattresses,  etc. All of these leach toxins into the air.

Some animals have a very low tolerance, or their general health is weakened to the point that they are sensitive.  I’ve seen some serious aggression cases improved when the dog’s overall health improves.

I do not suggest trying ‘at home’ detoxes and homeopathic remedies. Always consult a veterinarian. Pay for the blood work. Never guess or let anyone tell you that they ‘have a gift’ or are a ‘natural.’

Disease and Illness

There are three things I look for when determining whether medical issues are an underlying issue causing a dog’s behavior problems.

1. Did the problem start suddenly.
2. Is the dog’s behavior unpredictable or erratic?
3. Does the dog act in a way that is not typical of dog behavior?
4. Video the dog walking, trotting, playing several times. Play it slow. Do you see the dog ‘adjusting’ it’s weight to favor one leg, or one leg taking a shorter step/longer step, even if it is not continual.
5. If you touch a spot on your dog does it’s head ‘snap back’ or does it look at you and give you a ‘wide eyed’ (you see the whites of it’s eyes) look.
6. You start thinking that your dog is sad, or depressed.

A dog cannot tell us it is in pain. Many dogs are in extreme pain, or have been in pain a long time before we realize that something is wrong. In many cases, our first indication that something is wrong is a change in the dog’s temperament.

Next Step:

Before thinking that teaching a dog to ‘look’ is going to solve your problems then I suggest taking care of your dog’s wellness.

The next step is to give your dog a calm, quiet environment to allow them to regain balance and stop stressing (see our articles on trigger stacking). Next, learn all you can about living with a reactive dog.

The post Health Issues May Cause Reactivity and Aggression in Dogs appeared first on Sport Dog Training Center.

Just this weekend a puppy jumped into Carlo’s face and he gently placed his muzzle over the puppy’s muzzle. The incident lasted less than a second. The puppy didn’t scream or back up in fear. It just sat down and remained sitting down while the owner’s drama flared.

I have to admit I wasn’t very interested in the drama. What caught my attention is how this small demand for ‘deference behavior’ taught the puppy a lesson that it may never have learned. The puppy wasn’t afraid of Carlos, it learned that if it wanted to greet Carlos then it needed to do it politely.

Learned Behaviors – Unnatural Dog Behavior

Many people who feel that their dog needs a ‘childhood’ inadvertently teach a dog this inappropriate greeting behavior. It is simple. Your puppy is excited to see you. This fills an emotional void, or triggers an emotional response in you. Your response is to smile, spend time with the puppy, comfort the puppy, and reinforce the behavior.

What happens is that you ‘imprint’ over the dog’s normal behavior teaching it a new behavior.  What you’ve done is taught the puppy a new behavior. You’ve taught your puppy a new way to greet, and you’ve taught the puppy it is acceptable.

Unfortunately, in dogs, over-arousal becomes anxiety, anxiety becomes reactivity, reactivity becomes aggression. Dog’s temperament never stays stagnant. It is always becoming more or becoming less.

Appeasement Behaviors

Now let’s move forward a few months. Your puppy is bigger. It’s overt and hyper/play attempts to greet you are no longer pleased with this greeting and become frustrated or angry. The puppy knows this but doesn’t know why. This increases the dog’s anxiety level.

You try to teach the dog to stop jumping on you, and the problem gets worse. This is really easy to understand. Your puppy knows how to appease you and make you happy. It learned how to make you happy when it was young.

You changed the rules. The dog didn’t. The dog will continue to exhibit the same behaviors it did when it was young trying to elicit the same response from you. This will increase the anxiety level on both sides which, increases the appeasement behaviors. It becomes a vicious circle until one day you have a ‘reactive dog.’

Deference Behaviors

Can you fix this? Yes and no. There is no quick fix. You may need to learn some calming protocols. Your dog may need therapy to overcome the high emotional response, and chemical response, to over-arousal/anxiety. The fact is, I can’t give you a 1-2-3 cure strategy because each dog’s problem is based on different emotions and chemical responses to stimuli. 

• Hyper is a dog behavior
• Calm is a dog behavior
• Your dog will exhibit the one that earns it attention and rewards

Your dog also needs to learn Deference Behaviors. They need to learn to wait for attention. They need to ‘learn’ a new behavior. You do not teach a new behavior by punishing the old. You teach a new behavior by setting up the dog to do the new ‘action’ and then rewarding it. Just like when you taught your puppy to be over the top aroused and crazy when meeting someone.

For more information and help with Dog Behavior, contact us, or read more of our blog.

The post Dog Behavior: Friendly or Obnoxious – Joy or Anxiety? appeared first on Sport Dog Training Center.

What these dogs were learning was to ignore other dogs. They were learning that it is okay a dog is walking directly towards your dog, and makes eye contact.  If another dog is panicking, or over excited, your dog doesn’t need to ‘act out’.

This new student’s dog was walking quietly within 20 minutes. I explained that this class was working on Social Tolerance. Another way to label this is ‘Dog-Dog tolerance’.

It’s well known that domestic dogs form dominance relationships, with many researchers noting that the hierarchies that are formed are linear (for further discussion please see “Dogs Display Dominance: Deniers Offer No Credible Debate” and many links therein). In a linear hierarchy, if individual A dominates (>) B, and B > C, then A > C. There are no circular relationships such as C > A. In dogs and other animals, as few as three dogs can form a linear hierarchy, despite claims that it takes six or more individuals to do so. 

Intragroup agonistic interactions in free-ranging dogs are usually characterized by low-intensity aggression, which is consistent with the fact that they are cooperative carnivores. Moreover, our preliminary dog–wolf comparison contradicts the view that domestication has reduced social tolerance in dogs relative to wolves. Future studies should explore the meaning of “unknown relationships” in free-ranging dogs. If egalitarian/unresolved relationships actually exist in free-ranging dog packs, then we should conclude that a linear hierarchy model is just an approximate one (although effective) to describe the social structure of these animals.

Dominance Aggression is Related to Age

Your puppy is not aggressive, because it is socially ‘limited’. It doesn’t have the physical ability to be aggressive. This changes when the dog becomes 18 months, 2 years, or 3 years old. You cannot let a dog ‘ride’ and ‘do its own thing’ for 18 months and then ‘hope’ that the problem can fixed. You have let your dog bully you all its life, act out, and be pushy. Your dog isn’t going to want to change now.

So, as a result of this very detailed analysis, we learn that age-graded linear hierarchies are common — dominance is correlated with age — and potentially injurious fighting among free-ranging dogs is very rare. Related to the lack of fighting, we also now know when dogs growl in serious contests they do so honestly, likely telling others that they mean what they say. During play, this is not the case (for more details please see “Dogs Growl Honestly and Women Understand Better Than Men“). The researchers in the study of growling conclude (link is external), “Our results indicate that dogs may communicate honestly their size and inner state in a serious contest situation, while manipulatively in more uncertain defensive and playful contexts.” 

Dominance Aggression is Related to Communication

If your dog cannot communicate with you then it will not understand its boundaries.  Most dogs with behavior problems have a vocabulary under 10 words.  Social tolerance is linked to communication and understanding. The more cognitive a dog is, the less emotional it is. Or, the more a dog responds without corrections, the less aggressive it is.  

What is Social Tolerance – For Dogs

Social intolerance is an intolerance towards ideas (What the dog wants) or ways different from what makes the dog feel good. It is characterized by avoidance behaviors, refusal to obey or work with its owner, fighting/bullying the owner, or aggression.  

In dogs, it can be related to the dog’s needs. If the dog is fearful it may not tolerate going for a walk. It may lunge and pull.  If the dog is frustrated/stressed because it is locked in the house too much and/or not exercised then it might start chasing the cat.

Teaching a dog social tolerance is teaching it ‘stress coping skills’ so that it can relax and enjoy life in our homes, instead of having to endure, or suffer in our homes. We see many dogs that do not want to go for a walk. The dog fears other dogs. It has never been taught that it doesn’t need to worry about being attacked. So this dog pulls, lunges, barks, and ‘acts out’  The dog has low ‘tolerance’ to its environment.

So, in many ways, ignoring social tolerance in your dog’s early stages (8 – 16 weeks, 6 – 9 months, 12 – 18 months) is the foundation of many behavior and training problems.

How to Improve Your Dog’s Social Tolerance

I’ve addressed this in many socializing articles. But the most important is to treat your puppy in a way that teaches it how to act when the dog is 3 years old. If you want a calm dog, then raise a calm puppy.  Puppies, like children, need to be ‘expected’ to demonstrate polite manners when around others.

HOW do you teach this? It is easy. You start ‘before’ your puppy is displaying bad behaviors. You take the puppy out into the world and around things that it might have a problem with, and you play with it. You don’t force it to engage with scary things. In fact, if your puppy is showing any stress then move farther away, and play with your puppy.  And, keep your puppy in classes for 18 months. It can be any type of class from obedience, rally, or search and rescue, drug detection, or therapy dog programs.

The post Dominance: What is Social Tolerance and Why Should I Care? appeared first on Sport Dog Training Center.

The Goals and Objectives of any Classical Conditioning Program

• To make your dog more cognitive
• To teach your dog coping skills
• Once your dog can think (cognitive) and has stress coping skills, then it can learn to handle its emotions.
• Once a dog can handle its emotions then it can handle its reactions.

 If you don’t work towards all goals then a) your program will take a year or more to see change and b) you may actually make your dog worse.

Top 10 Rules of Canine Classical Conditioning

1. It is only used for emotions. When there is nothing dangerous in the area and your dog acts like a character from a horror movie just walked into your house, or turned the corner on a walk.
2. It is only used on dogs that have not ‘bitten with intent to cause harm’. If your dog falls into this category then you need to be working with a professional.
3. It is only for changing a behavior – NOT for training a trick or task. The positive only owners, and some clicker trainers will like to tell you otherwise. The fact is, when classical conditioning is done right the dog is reinforced every time.
4. The reinforcer (treat, tug, toy, touch) is given every time – Every Single Time! It doesn’t matter if your dog is going cujo. If your dog can eat a treat then it gets one.
5. If your dog cannot eat a treat, STOP. Your dog is too stressed (over threshold) and you are doing more damage than good.
6. Only work your dog when it is calm, when you are calm, and when you are in a controlled environment. If your dog barks at dogs when on a walk then ‘DON’T’ take it for a walk to ‘set up’ a situation.
7. Don’t jump to the biggest trigger first. Start with something simple. If your dog is afraid of men wearing hats then start with a man with no hat. Like ‘loading the clicker’ the results will happen faster if your dog has already created ‘coping skills’ to use to help it deal with its fear/stress reaction.
8. Practice for 1 minute, 10x day. If you cannot do this then join a reactive dog class – this therapy is not for you.
9. Consistency is the key. Yes, I know what you are going to say. “My dog is getting worse.” That is okay. Just keep doing the therapy, it will work.
10. Don’t stop. It doesn’t matter whether your dog starts behaving better. Don’t stop. It doesn’t matter if your dog is getting more ‘drama’. Don’t stop. It doesn’t matter whether you have been practicing for 2 weeks, 2 months, 2 years – don’t stop.

Before You Get Started: Canine Assessment

Is your dog right for this? You may want to get a ‘behaviorist’ with certification (not a trainer) to assess your dog. Not all dogs are fearful or stressed. I’ve met several dogs that look reactive, but are bullies. They realized they can make others feel fear. They do it for fun. I’ve met dogs that are frustrated or bored. They react to ‘let it out’ and try to ‘self-satisfy.’

If your dog ‘wants’ to hurt another dog then you need to move very slow.

“It didn’t Work!” 2 Step Back Rule

Therapy for a reactive dog is a journey, it is not a destination. You are not a professional. You will make mistakes. So, when you do make a mistake, push your dog too fast, take your dog too near the trigger, then ‘take 2 steps back.’

This doesn’t mean to physically move back 2 paces, but move 2 steps back in your protocol. Let’s say you are doing Karen Overall’s Calming Protocol. Your dog can make it to day 8, then fails. In our method you would try day 8 again. If your dog fails again, then move back to day 6.

In classical conditioning we use ‘barriers’ between the dog and the trigger. Your dog is good with men. Your dog is good with hats. Your dog is good with men holding hats. Your dog is good with men sitting in a chair, 20’ away, with a hat on. (NO do not move closer to see where his threshold is!).

Tomorrow you bring the dog out and the dog moves a 3’ feet closer – great.  Five days later your dog moves another 3’. Two days later your dog moves 2’ closer but continually looks at the man, is distracted, spins a few times. At this stage we move back to the 2’ gained today, and the 3’ gained the other day. If your dog is still showing stress, you move 2 days more.

Don’t worry if you move all the way back to step one. Your dog is learning ‘coping skills’. If you let your dog swing back and forth on its own, then you will see success sooner.

Step #2 Canine Coping Skills Building

In our center the average dog is good in 3 – 5 weeks. About 50% of the rest of the dogs are good

Confidence Training

in 8 – 20 weeks. About 1 in 20 dogs take a year for a complete emotional change. (These are based on our numbers, and only on the dogs that didn’t quit.

So, your dog will now walk up cautiously to men with hats, sitting in your house. Your dog will ‘hold it together’ while men in hats appear when you are on a walk.  Stop here. Stay at this place for 2 months. Write it on your calendar. Give your dog time to learn to relax.

In this time we want you to build confidence and strengthen those coping skills.  I have a list of things I ask people to do – daily.

• Tellington touch
• Play an ‘engaged’ game like tug, or follow me through an obstacle course. (you can make one in the back yard using stuff around the house)
• Teach a new trick/task each week
• Teach a ‘long’ down stay
• Use the reactive exercises on everything that causes the dog to become over aroused: door bells, the mail man, you waking up in the morning, the treat bag opening, picking up the leash to go for a walk, getting in the car, etc.
• Don’t go for walks. Instead, go to a quiet park and play with your dog, then go home.
• Change the dog’s environment every 2 – 3 days. Take your dog somewhere new, that is not scary.
•  Start raising your dog’s frustration tolerance threshold ‘With a Professional 
• Start Teaching ‘calming’ protocols and make them a part of your dog’s daily routine.

Behavior Recovery

The important thing to remember is that this is not a quick fix. You are changing your dog’s lifestyle, and your expectations. If you feel that you are going to ‘go back’ to the lifestyle/methods that caused the problem than classical conditioning is not for you.

In Applied Behavior Modification Recovery means to return to the prior behavior. In dog training we call this ‘fading’.  A dog’s emotions are not stagnant. They are either continually becoming calmer and more confident, or the dog is returning to survival mode (reactive).

Disclaimer

This is not our entire Behavioral Modification Therapy Methodology. It is not meant to be. It is only meant to give you an ideal of how a Classical Conditioning program works, and why your attempts may have failed. If you would like to discuss this more then please send me an email.

The post Classical Conditioning: Reinforcing Bad Behavior or Changing Behavior? appeared first on Sport Dog Training Center.

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“Many peoples die at twenty-five and aren’t buried until they are seventy-five.” (Benjamin Franklin)

Often, when we publish a pertinent study, the ones who refuses to evolve, argue. No explanation, no factual documentation; just empty opinion. When we ask for references, the usual response is, “I train horses for 45 years.”  Interestingly, it is always 45 years. Therefore, according to Benjamin Franklin, their thirst for knowledge died at 30 and they spent 45 years repeating the same thing. 

Many horses die mentally at four or five, when they are submitted into performances for which their physique is not properly educated and coordinated. They shut off because there is no meaning in their life and their body survives one or two decades until their physique cans no longer take the abuse. They go through a life of dysfunction, mental blankness and physical pain, because traditional education does not upgrade equitation to actual scientific knowledge.

(http://www.scienceofmotion.com/documents/meaning_of_life_12.html)
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The fact is, we shouldn’t be focused on what works. We should be focused on the dog. When we shift our focus to the dog’s needs then the argument takes on new meaning. If you put a prong collar on an over-aroused lab and you get it to walk nicely in 1 week, but it has shut down mentally, then you have failed the dog.

If you put a prong collar on a Doberman, and he is able to focus, learn, and develop a relationship with his owner then we have not failed the dog.

What Is The Best Way To Train A Dog?

First of all, get rid of the words ‘train’ and ‘obedience.’  Both of those imply that the dog’s mental stimulation is not important. The end result is having the dog physically execute a series of movements to achieve what we call obedience. It allows us to ignore the fact that the dog has shut down mentally, is over aroused and/or frustrated, or has lost all interest in life.

This can be achieved by both a) using treats to make it look like the dog has learned, or b) using corrections so you don’t need to waste time teaching the dog. Yes, both positive and punishment dog training methods can cause a dog to lose interest and shut down.

Performance Dogs and Sport Dogs

Are we taking away our dog’s love for life? Have we replaced the dog’s love and joy for over-arousal and hyper-anxiety – just to win ribbons?  I sit at an agility competition and listen to the number of dogs barking their frustration. You cannot be frustrated and happy at the same time.

I have seen so many people invest several hours weekly, or daily, and get titles at 6 months old. Then at 3 years old their dog has retired.  It is common in the dog world to assume that a dog only has a short performance career. But then I see dogs in freestyle dance, or police dogs, SAR dogs, all working well into their 10^th year. Are the performance and sport dog people missing something?

Fix The Problem – It’s a Journey not an End Goal

Maybe we need to step back and spend more time giving our dogs interesting things to do. Challenges and puzzles to solve. Maybe we need to stop the cycle of ignoring our dog until it is time to work them. Or maybe play needs to become more intimate – not just a reward for performing.

There is a fine line between teaching a dog and mental abuse. Here are some of my observations of people whose dogs are performing after 3 years old. This is only typically, and doesn’t pertain to every dog.

• The trainer ‘shaped’ their dog. They didn’t train.
• There are ‘outings’ that have nothing to do with training, trials, or shows.
• The dog has boundaries.
• Obedience and training are a lifestyle – not a ‘task’ to be done for 10 minutes a day, or on Wed at class.
• Dogs are touched often.
• Dogs are not constantly fed treats.
• Dogs are not corrected
• Owners talk to their dogs more often.
• Dogs are mentally stimulated

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