When encountered with owning an aggressive dog, just about every owner wants the dog to stop what it is doing and with good reason. A dog that growls, barks, and bites just isn’t pleasurable to live with, plus it’s also a liability. The trouble can be intensified depending on how and when the dog is worked with.
When:
Unfortunately, many owners are embarrassed by what their dog is doing. So embarrassed in fact that they wait way too long to seek professional help or they just don’t get help at all. Some owners are afraid of being blamed for what the dog is doing. The problem with this situation is that many types of aggression are far easier to alter when the dog is young or the problem is fresh. Allowing many acts of aggression to occur over a long period of time really helps ingrain the issue deeply. For example, a 6 month old puppy just beginning to show dog aggression on walks is far easier to work with than a 7 year old dog that has been doing it for years!
How:
There are as many schools of thought on how to handle aggression as there are on how to train a dog to walk. Some methodologies are kind in their application and look towards what is affecting the dog while other methods focus on simply stopping the dog’s problem in the fastest manner possible. After all, if you stop his growling, you stop his aggression, right?
This is where the heart of the problem lies. It’s just not as simple as that. If you’re scared to death of the dark and small spaces, and I say knock it off and lock you in a darkened closet, does that help your problem or do you become more frightened, more enraged? You get the idea.
Punishment and intimidating techniques as a method
Using punishment as a training method is nothing new and has existed for so many years. It has seeped into every area of dog training including behavior modification. One of the primary problems with punishment is that it doesn’t teach the dog how to you want it to behave; it simply suppresses the behavior you don’t like. It also does little to change how a dog feels about the situation. For example, a dog frightened of people who reacts aggressively to them may suppress some of that initial aggression towards new people because of punishment, but he doesn’t feel any better about the people. This can lead to renewed aggression. His growling may have been suppressed but now he moves to just biting instead because he is still frightened and punishment didn’t alter this.
The American Veterinary Society of Animal Behavior (www.avsabonline.org) has outlined a few disadvantages that arise with punishment. Many of these issues have been known and documented from research studies since the 1960s:
- A dog can become accustomed to the level of punishment which means the owner will have to increase the intensity.
- The owner can cause injury to the dog (accidentally or intentionally) through punishment.
- Punishment works on a fear response in the dog and this fear response can actually be translated to things that look or sound similar to the dog.
- Punishment can lead to more aggression or heightened aggression.
- It can inhibit the learning process for a dog.
- A dog can react negatively to punishment and possible harm the person administering it or those nearby.
- Punishment just suppresses the outward signs of aggression but doesn’t alter the internal feelings or motivations behind the aggression.
But I saw it on tv….
The best advice is to not to believe everything you see on tv. Television programs are highly edited into a show that will be entertaining for viewers. Viewers want to see a problem solved in that short time frame which isn’t realistic in the real world. Punishment techniques often give the fastest suppressing results for the viewer, who by the way never gets to see what happens after the show.
(By the way, if you watch closely, you’ll notice that even tv trainers have dogs they own that still misbehave or have problems too)
Aggression is something that should be dealt with head-on in a professional manner that works to address the heart of that dog’s aggression. Only behavior modification tailored that direction will be effective. This normally means that the average dog owner should seek out professional assistance at the first sign of aggression. Don’t wait for it to become a pronounced problem that is much harder to work with.
The best place to begin your search is the Association of Pet Dog Trainers. Look for a trainer that is skilled and comfortable working with aggression. If you’re lucky enough to have a dog behaviorist located near you, this is an excellent resource as well.
Dog aggression and behavior expert with 30 years of experience.
