Stop Dog Aggression

Recognizing, preventing, and handling dog aggression

There's a lot that we can do to prevent aggression and even if prevention hasn't been possible (for whatever reason), there are still steps that we can take to recognize and deal with it efficiently.

There are several different types of canine aggression. The two most common ones are:

These two different types of aggression stem from very different causes, and require different types of treatment.

Aggressive behaviour towards strangers is pretty easy to tell when a dog's nervy around strange people. He's jumpy and on the alert. Either he can't sit still and is constantly fidgeting, leaping at the smallest sound, and pacing around barking and whining or he's very still, sitting rock-steady in one place, staring hard at the object of his suspicions (a visitor, someone approaching him on the street while he's tied up outside a store.)

One major reason why a dog doesn't like strange people is he's never had the chance to get used to them. Remember, your dog relies 100% on you to broaden his horizons for him. Without being taken on lots of outings to see the world and realize for himself, through consistent and positive experiences, that the unknown doesn't necessarily equal bad news for him, how can he realistically be expected to relax in an unfamiliar situation?

The process of accustoming your dog to the world and all the strange people (and animals) that it contains is called socialization. This is an incredibly important aspect of your dog's upbringing. In fact, it's pretty hard to over emphasize just how important it is. Socializing your dog means exposing him from a young age (generally speaking, as soon as he's had his vaccinations) to a wide variety of new experiences, new people, and new animals.

When you socialize your dog, you're getting him to learn through experience that new sights and sounds are fun, not scary.

It's not enough to expose an adult dog to a crowd of unfamiliar people and tell him to "Settle down, Fido, it's OK" he has to learn that it's OK for himself. And he needs to do it from puppyhood for the lesson to sink in.

The more types of people and animals he meets (babies, toddlers, teenagers, old people, men, women, people wearing uniforms, people wearing motorcycle helmets, people carrying umbrellas, etc) in a fun and relaxed context, the more at ease and happy and safe around strangers he'll be in general.

Socialization doesn't just stop when the puppy reaches adulthood. It's an ongoing effort throughout the life of your puppy and dog. He needs to be taken to a whole bunch of new places and environments.

Remember not to overwhelm him.  Start off slow, and build up his tolerance gradually.

Aggression towards family members

There are two common reasons why a dog is aggressive towards members of his own human family:

  1. He's trying to defend something he thinks of as his from a perceived threat (you).

This is known as resource guarding, and though it may sound innocuous, there's actually a lot more going on here than your dog simply trying to keep his kibble to himself.

Resource guarding is pretty common among dogs. The term refers to overly-possessive behaviour on behalf of your dog. For instance, snarling at you if you approach him when he's eating, or giving you "the eye" (a flinty-eyed, direct stare) if you reach your hand out to take a toy away from him.

All dogs can be possessive from time to time  it's in their natures. Sometimes they're possessive over things with no conceivable value: inedible trash, balled up pieces of paper or tissue, old socks. More frequently, however, resource-guarding becomes an issue over items with a very real and understandable value: food and toys.

It all boils down to the issue of dominance.  Dogs are pack animals and this means that they're used to a very structured environment. In a dog-pack, each individual animal is ranked in a hierarchy of position and power (or dominance) in relation to every other animal. Each animal is aware of the rank of every other animal, which means he knows specifically how to act in any given situation (whether to back down, whether to push the issue, whether to muscle in or not on somebody else's turf, etc etc).

To your dog, the family environment is no different to the dog-pack environment. Your dog has ranked each member of the family, and has his own perception of where he ranks in that environment as well.

This is where it gets interesting: if your dog perceives himself as higher up on the social totem-pole than other family members, he's going to get cheeky. If he's really got an overinflated sense of his own importance, he'll start to act aggressively.

Why? Because dominance and aggression are the exclusive rights of a superior-ranked animal. No underdog would ever show aggression or act dominantly to a higher-ranked animal (the consequences would be dire, and he knows it!)

Resource guarding is a classic example of dominant behavior.  Only a higher-ranked dog (a "dominant" dog) would act aggressively in defence of resources.

To put it plainly: if it was clear to your dog that he is not, in fact, the leader of the family, he'd never even dream of trying to prevent you from taking his food or toys because a lower-ranking dog (him) will always go along with what the higher-ranking dogs (you and your family) say.

So what can I do about it? The best treatment for dominant, aggressive behavior is consistent, frequent obedience work, which will underline your authority over your dog. Just two fifteen-minute sessions a day will make it perfectly clear to your dog that you're the boss, and that it pays to do what you say.

You can make this fact clear to him by rewarding him (with treats and lavish praise) for obeying a command, and isolating him (putting him in "time-out", either outside the house or in a room by himself) for misbehaviour.

Why doesn't my dog like to be handled?

All dogs have different handling thresholds. Some dogs like lots of cuddles, and are perfectly content to be hugged, kissed, and have arms slung over their shoulders (this is the ultimate I'm the boss gesture to a dog, which is why a lot of them won't tolerate it.) Others  usually the ones not accustomed to a great deal of physical contact from a very young age aren't comfortable with too much full-body contact and will get nervy and agitated if someone persists in trying to hug them.

Another common cause of handling-induced aggression is a bad grooming experience: nail-clipping and bathing are the two common culprits.

For more information on handling aggressive and dominant behaviors, as well as a great deal of detailed information on a host of other common dog behavior problems, check out SitStayFetch.

It's a complete owner's guide to owning, rearing, and training your dog, and it deals with all aspects of dog ownership.

To get the inside word on preventing and dealing with problem behaviours like aggression and dominance in your dog, SitStayFetch is well worth a look.

You can visit the SitStayFetch site by clicking on the link below:
Dog Obedience Training

SitStayFetch has more than one training technique detailed to allow you to pick and choose the techniques that best suit you and your dog.