Understanding The Dominant Dog

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Sam Basso
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The “Rules of Dominance” are those social standards by which a dog and another individual interact.  These Rules are both learned and genetically programmed.  You can’t have an obedient dog without Bonding, Imprinting and Socialization, Teaching and Training, and Dominance.

THE MASTER IMAGE

In dog society, dogs are programmed by their genetics to see society as a somewhat vertical hierarchy of leaders and followers.  When we talk of leadership, we use the word DOMINANCE to describe leadership and SUBMISSION to describe following.  The MASTER is the leader, and the dog is the follower.  It has to be this way.  In order to have an obedient dog, you must become the dog’s leader, and you must Train the dog and maintain the Training throughout the dog’s life.  Your dog must have a MASTER to be obedient. The Master must guide the behaviors of the dog. The dog is NOT a slave, however. Those who teach dominance oftentimes portray an image of an obedient dog being a robot… and that is not at all what I advocate or teach. A dog must to be guided and led by the dog’s Master… society demands that of us. We have to be accountable and responsible for what our dogs do and don’t do.

There are four types of roles that you don’t want to assume in your dog’s life: The Tyrant, The Rival, The Scientist, or The Doormat.

The Tyrant is the person that bullies, and possibly abuses, their dog.  All this person ends up with is either a dog that’s afraid of them, or one that eventually decides it won’t take the punishment any more and attacks someone.

The Rival is the person that places themselves at the same level of authority with their dog, where the dog is continually tempted to seek to be the leader in the relationship.  The Rival puts them in a position where the dog thinks that it has to fight for the important things in its life.

The Scientist is the person that believes that they can train a dog like you program a computer, input/output, treats/behavior.  This approach has become very popular today.  Many so-called trainers believe and teach the myth that you can just train a dog with positive reinforcement.  The truth is that there is a place in all dog training where “No!” has to be enforced in order for you to maintain a proper leadership role with your dog.

The Doormat is the person that gives their leadership over to the dog, and spoils their dog.  Some people just aren’t mentally and/or physically capable of leading certain dogs.  You should never get a dog that will be more dominant than you!

What a dog needs is a proper image of you as its Master.  This MASTER IMAGE is the way your dog views you as its leader.  Dogs read human behavior better than humans read dog behavior.  They can tell when you are being a leader and when you aren’t.  A proper Master Image is a carefully crafted role you assume in your dog’s life.  It begins the first day you bring your dog home.

It’s our job as dog owners to help a dog understand our rules.  On the other hand, dogs are predatory pack animals.  There is a limit to how much we can modify and teach these rules to a dog.

Dominance is manifested in five ways: How a dog

1.  Resists or complies with active or passive control of its behavior.  One indicator of a dominant dog is its reaction to being corrected.  A dominant dog resents and resists correction, even to the point of getting actively aggressive, with a subordinate handler.  Another indicator of a dominant dog is how it uses its body to push people around.  The dominant dog has a tendency to use its body to shove the handler around, and to resent it if the handler gets in the dog’s way. The dominant dog will resist being rolled over onto it’s back, not out of fear. The dominant dog isn’t worried about what you are doing, or afraid of rolling over if it is done on their terms (such as for a treat or a toss of a toy). The dominant dog will typically warn you, first by stiffening, then growling, before attacking you. It is highly dangerous to roll a dominant dog onto it’s side or back, especially if you are attempting to do an “alpha roll” type of correction (something that I advise against).

2.  Attempts to control the behavior of others.  The dominant dog will insert itself between people or other dogs to control their interactions.  They want to determine how the interactions will take place and who gets the preferred treatment.  For example, a very dominant dog will seek to determine whether a stranger can approach a child in the family. They will also interfere with others interacting with one another, including people and other animals. I’ve seen dominant dogs that will pounce if other dogs are playing too rambunctiously. I’ve seen them seek to control the movement of people within the home, blocking them as they went through the home. I’ve seen them interfere with a husband and wife hugging one another.

3.  Determines status relationships.  The dominant dog expects and forces other dogs to defer to him or her.  The less dominant dog offers submissive gestures to others to communicate that they are not seeking to control the other person or animal. I’ve seen dominant dogs get aggressive when you try to manipulate them into positions they don’t want to be in, such as laying down or rolling them on their backs. They won’t let you do these things to them.

4.  Controls access to “resources” and reinforcements.  The dominant dog will seek control to obtain first right of refusal over toys, territory, food, and social attention.  The less dominant dog will give up, or will be forced to give up, to the more dominant dog. Not all dogs are dominant when they get the tennis ball first, or who growl and guard their toy or food bowl. But, sometimes it is an indicator, when you look at the entire picture of what is going on with that dog.

5.  Perceives itself and others and whether it can “lose face” in a confrontation or interaction.  The dominant dog perceives itself as being a caretaker and leader of those around him or her, especially those that it perceives as being weaker or of a subordinate status.  In addition, the truly dominant dog recognizes and won’t back down from a challenge to its perceived status. One test is the “stare test” (don’t do this on your own, it is dangerous with the dominant dog): a direct stare at a dominant dog will result in the dog locking eyes with you, then the growling, posturing or even a full blown attack commences. So-called trainers who deny that there is such a thing as a dominant dog either refuse to recognize what is going on right in front of them, or they will one day deal with such a dog and someone will be attacked and severely mauled.  Then, there are dogs that cannot recognize the signs of submission, which therefore won’t stop attacking even after the other has given up the confrontation. That isn’t the same thing as the dog being dominant. I’ve seen dominant dogs get aggressive when they perceive the other dog or person as being “rude” to them.

DOMINANCE AGGRESSION

Dominance Aggression is competitive social aggression.  Dominance Aggression appears in competitive situations over status, social interactions, resources and reinforcements.  The potential for competitive aggression is always present whenever you are dealing with a dog.

Open Aggression is usually a last resort, not a first resort, set of behaviors that result over a competitive social situation.  Dominance aggression is generally provoked when a dog perceives itself to be in competition over control of its behavior, the behavior or interactions of others, resources, reinforcements and/or status.  The competition “ties” the dog into the situation… and then its canine genetics compels the dog to settle the issue.

Dominance is maintained through Open Aggression, Forms of Aggression and Deference Behaviors.  Open Aggression is a full-blown fight. Forms of Aggression are substitutes for a fight, such as posturing, vocalizations, threats, etc.  Deference Behaviors are actions that avoid Open Aggression and help to terminate Forms of Aggression.  When one dog defers to a person or other animal… it says, in effect, “take it, it’s yours, I don’t want to fight” and that usually terminates a full-blown fight.

Most dominant dogs will respect displays of deference and the confrontation is defused.  However, if one party doesn’t defer, up front, to the other, then a challenge or fight takes place.  I liken this to “saber rattling”, where one party, or the other, or both, make any number of threatening gestures.  These gestures test the true intentions of the other party.  If the other party backs down, then there’s no fight.  If neither party backs down, then there’s going to be a fight to force a settlement, meaning that one dog will MAKE the other submit to it through force.

All of this posturing can blow up into a full-blown fight in a split second.  Dogfights aren’t fun to watch and are dangerous to break up.  However, it’s not fair to blame one dog over another for starting the fight, since dogs are programmed to act this way.  It isn’t sufficient to say that just because a dog acted inappropriately, according to you, that the behavior was abnormal canine behavior, even if the behavior was extremely intense.  Abnormal aggressive behaviors would be confined to those that are clearly unpredictable, uncontrollable, and unable to be changed… clearly a “diseased” or “vicious” dog, which should be put to death.

Dominance Aggression is something to be molded and controlled and supervised, but is a normal part of the entire repertoire of dog behavior.

Dominance Aggression commonly develops at social maturity: 12 to 36 months of age.  It is differentiated from the behavior of a tough, aggressive and strong puppy — these behaviors need to be dealt with very early.  Young puppies are allowed by older dogs to act especially assertive… which may account for why “interdog aggression” appears at puberty since the older dogs no longer give the pup the same “grace” that they did when pup was younger.  Often younger dogs display deferential attitudes to their superiors until social maturity, then they lose their free ride and begin to challenge for status.