My Male Dogs Want To Fight
Aggression is a difficult topic to explain and treat. First, we want all dogs to get along, and it is hard to understand why dogs that were friends are now in conflict. Second, it is hard to find research studies on dog fights because of the obvious difficulty and danger of working with aggressively stimulated […]
When Punishing Your Dog Backfires
Small example. Your dog has been punished for every little thing while you are home. Punishment is a learning theory term which means applying a consequence that reduces the frequency of a behavior. It doesn’t necessarily imply that you’ve done something horrible to your dog… but we can discuss that further at another time. You […]
Adding A New Dog Into Your Home
Are you considering getting another dog? What do you need to do to have the highest chance of success? And what if your current dogs are fighting? The first consideration should be whether your current dogs have a culture that would be good for another dog. Groups are self-teaching. That can be good or bad. […]
Emotional And Behavioral Control In Dogs
Is it fair to expect dogs to immediately and correctly respond calmly or happily to changes in situations? Think about what this means. Your trained dog is calmly resting on her bed in the living room while you read a book. The doorbell rings, waking your dog up, causing your dog to run to the […]
Dog Training Science
It is disturbing to read the scientific research we all use to train dogs. The most famous of researchers had to make a decision to treat their subjects as unfeeling machines in order to do their experiments, and to then mock those who were concerned or who described how those animals were feeling. Science is […]
Behavioral Disturbances In Dogs
Does your dog suffer from an emotional behavioral disturbance, such as chronic generalized anxieties, depression, compulsive behaviors, or phobias? These neuroses are maladaptive, distressing conditions that are resistant to typical dog training methods. I’ve worked with dogs displaying disturbances like this which interfere with learning, cause physical symptoms, and exaggerated emotional displays. There was the […]
First Steps Training Your Dog
Dogs can become hypervigilant, looking for danger where it doesn’t exist and seeking stimulus that isn’t relevant to your presence, and too impulsive and having difficulty regulating their behavior. That imbalance is corrected as we get your dog to accept and look forward to more social interactions and all environments. We need reciprocating competent social […]
Playing With Your Dog?
Play is essential for good behavioral development in your dog. It comprises 4 elements that should be balanced: search/chase, possession, letting go, and rules to start and stop. Good tools are flirt poles (or toys on a cord to chase); tug toys; larger balls that can’t harm teeth (no tennis balls since they can be […]
Add Predictability To Your Dogs Life
Unpredictability makes dogs insecure and potentially destructive, neurotic, destructive, disobedient and/or aggressive. Events are either predictable or unpredictable, either controllable or uncontrollable. Anxiety happens when control is available but the resulting aversive event can’t be predicted. Frustration happens when a dog tries to do what it wants to do for a reward but is blocked […]
Can Every Dog Behavior Be Fixed?
Many dog behaviors are biased according to breed. We know that, right? As a general rule, purebred… Hunters want to hunt. Guards want to guard. Fighting breeds want to fight. This becomes a problem when you get the idea that training can override these behavioral scripts. (Even mixed bred dogs have certain biological tendencies.) Then […]