WHEN YOUR DOG BARKS AT VISITORS AND PEOPLE OUTSIDE THE HOME

Fearful Aggressive Behaviour

Nina Bondarenko BA IAABC ABTC

PART ONE

“My dog hates visitors

Dogs that are timid, fearful or insecure around people may develop into “aggressive” dogs. They start to growl at people and instead of avoiding or hiding away, they may lunge forwards and bark or even nip.  Owners frequently ask me to train the dog to be friendly to people because this is what they want from their dog - to be friendly, safe around children and playful with other dogs. Unfortunately timid, nervous dogs do not see people (especially children) as “friends”. 

Every dog is an individual. Puppies will begin to show behaviour and temperament differences from as early as 3 weeks of age. Genetics and the environment in which a puppy is raised all combine to create the personality and tendencies of each puppy. Fearful or shy puppies will tend to avoid situations in which other siblings are happy to investigate, and they will tend to stay at the back of the group as they grow. Many breeders refer to such puppies as “thinkers” but they are more likely to be cautious, insecure or even fearful.

Can you train him to be nicer?

Since this is the puppy’s temperament, we cannot train it to be “friendly” nor to regard humans and children as safe. Just like children within a family who may be more or less outgoing, or confident. However, we can modify the puppy’s emotional response to things that trigger the fearful behaviour and then teach the puppy a different way to deal with the stress being experienced when meeting visitors or interacting with people in the park or street. We can always teach dogs an alternative behaviour and to feel less stressed or fearful.

So rather than try to “train a dog to be friendly”, we will condition the dog to develop a more positive association with visitors and other people, whilst teaching the dog to react in a different way when stressed or frightened. Dogs learn quickly that barking and rushing forwards at someone will make them back off . As they grow older they become more inclined to escalate such behaviour to the point where they nip and even bite people. 

WTF?

With any unwanted behaviour, we always ask - WTF … what is the function? What does the dog get out of doing it? It makes them “feel better” in some way. So we have to help them learn to feel better doing something else instead of barking that is preferable to us.

So. What they need to learn is what to do when they feel stressed or threatened or insecure rather than lunging, barking, snapping or biting. Such behaviour is very rewarding to a dog because it is effective in making the person move away from the dog’s space.Dogs feel safer/ better if the person moves away. At some point we can begin modifying the dog’s emotional association with visitors or unfamiliar people to become more positive, but the dog may never feel completely safe or friendly. Therefore, if we are to teach a dog an alternative behaviour, it has to be as rewarding to the dog as barking or snapping. In other words, if we teach the dog to turn away (for example ) then the people MUST back away in response and move out of the dog’s space. This is rewarding to the dog and helps the dog feel more positive towards people. Unfortunately, people usually do the opposite to this - they try to reward the dog for going close to a person in the hope that this will make the dog friendly but it only makes the dog more stressed and anxious which then makes the dog more likely to bite.