When you learn their language you may realise that dogs never stop talking…
Signs that may indicate stress, anxiety or fear in dogs include a tucked tail, ears flat and back, licking the lips or nose, whale eye, looking away, raised paw, trembling, a low body posture, yawning, panting, grooming, sniffing, seeking out human comfort, hiding and a stiff or frozen posture. Some of these are also examples of displacement behaviour.
It is important not to focus on just one aspect of the body but rather one should observe the whole of the body whilst also considering the context and environment. An example could be a dog that lunges whilst on the lead. Is it because it is frustrated by the lead and may possibly otherwise be friendly off lead? Or perhaps it’s a genuine fear and the dog is exhibiting the behaviour in question to see off the other dog?
Clients are often unaware that their dog may be exhibiting signs of stress or fear. One study showed that about 30% of dogs in the veterinary waiting room displayed signs of stress which were not noticed by the owners and included panting, yawning and grooming.
Tails
A wagging tail does not always mean the dog is friendly as many people believe. If the dog is highly aroused, either positively or negatively, the tail often tends to be raised high. Tails tend to wag when a dog is emotionally aroused. Dogs may also use their tails as communicative signals which can include threatening displays or appeasement, play, nervousness, confusion, anxiety and fear.
Tense or loose body
A tense body can indicate uncertainty, apprehension or a feeling of being uncomfortable in the environment. When a dog freezes this could be a warning that the dog is preparing for a flight or fight response. If the warning is ignored, aggressive behaviour may happen. Conversely, a loose, soft and flexible body will indicate that the dog is relaxed and comfortable the environment.
Avoidance
Avoidance behaviour is characterised by a dog looking away or walking away and is an attempt to avoid conflict or confrontation. Cut off signals are generally used between two or more dogs and typically during play sessions or greetings. These are noticeable when a dog stops what it is doing and does something different such as yawning, lip licking, sniffing the ground or scratching. Dogs that have been well socialised will respond better to these signals than poorly socialised dogs. Those dogs less versed in this language may become confused and this may lead to aggression. Fearful avoidance is shown by a low head and tail with the body close to the floor as if trying to appear smaller.
Ears
Similar to the tail, what a dog does with its ears will give indications about the internal emotional state. Ears that are back and flat against the head may indicate a submissive feeling, especially in younger dogs. Ears that are back but not quite flat can be a sign of agitation. Perked up ears show the dog is alert and interested or perhaps to make the dog look bigger either to show aggression or as a response to aggression.
Patricia
McConnell and Karen London are ethologists, PHD level qualified. Both are
Certified Applied Animal Behaviourists and professional dog trainers
specialising in treating serious behavioural issues in domestic dogs.
Feisty Fido addresses the very specific behavioural issue of leash reactive dogs that demonstrate aggressive behaviour towards other dogs. The book offers advice in a very straight forward and easy to understand manner and is optimistic in its outlook; in the first few pages it states that even for most lead reactive dogs there is a high rate of successful treatment.
However, the book remains somewhat grounded and emphasises that it will not ‘create dogs who are good with all other dogs in all situations’ but rather more realistically states that what you will gain from the advice within the book is the ability to walk your dog on the lead around others without causing a scene (successful management is often the only realistic outcome.)
The essence
of the book revolves around the principles of counter conditioning and
desensitisation and provides easy to understand concepts and examples that even
someone new to dog training should be able grasp and therefore implement a
workable behaviour change programme so as to train a dog to exhibit behaviour
that is different to the current reaction to a stimulus.
The effectiveness
of counter conditioning and desensitisation is contingent on them being used
together. This methodology is often used in behaviour change programmes and
especially for types of behaviour associated with anxiety, fearfulness and
aggressiveness. Although often lengthy in process these techniques have a
proven track record of success and are appropriate in that they do not suppress
behaviour but rather they engage to alter the actual emotional response of the
dog to specific stimuli.
Desensitisation is the first part of the procedure in
which a learned fear is extinguished by gradual low level exposure to the
stimulus. The aim is that the dog is eventually exposed to the stimulus without
involuntary fear responses being evoked. It should be noted that the process of
desensitisation may allow the subject to get to a position of feeling neutral
to the stimulus rather than fearful but it will not elicit positively pleasing
emotions.
It is with counterconditioning that the respondent
behaviour of the dog to a stimulus is replaced with a contrasting automatic
response. The process can actually replace an undesirable response to a
stimulus with a positive emotional response instead. This is achieved by
the association of the aversive stimulus with something salient and appetitive
while the dog is under the threshold of emotional arousal. Nonetheless, the
book is also realistic and certainly lays no claim for a silver bullet or a
quick fix and stresses that in reality the process of serious behaviour modification
takes time, patience and consistency.
By using
these approaches the book proceeds to teach what it refers to as the watch, the same contingency is often
called look at me and simply means
gaining the dog’s attention. This is one of the most important of behaviours to
teach in dog-training as teaching a dog to focus on you is paramount. The
procedure outlined in this book advises training to start in areas with no
distractions which then graduates systematically and slowly with low
distractions set at a sub threshold distance, working towards a situation of
more prominent distractions until a point that the subject will eventually
learn that whenever they see another dog, it is better to watch you than to pay
attention to the other dog.
The second training
technique outlined is teaching the dog the U-Turn. As the name suggests this
involves training the dog to turn 180 degrees and go the other way upon seeing
another dog. The rationale behind this is to encourage the dog to follow the
client away from the stimulus without having to be tugged on the lead, which in
itself can exacerbate leash reactivity. Again, this process is slow and
systematic and one that starts with no distractions and works up to higher
levels of distractions but is a very worthwhile exercise.
As might be
expected this book takes an ethical path and follows the obligation to find the
least intrusive intervention possible, these are the principles and techniques
that have come to be known and are referred to as positive reinforcement. In
this instance intrusiveness is defined by the degree to which any method causes
harm either physically or emotionally to the dog.
Unsurprisingly
the book avoids any reference to methods of shock or startle. It is alarmingly
common advice that dogs expressing fear or aggressive behaviour be shocked or
startled at the point of the undesired behaviour being exhibited in attempt to
stop the behaviour. This ranges from spraying the dog in the face with water to
using an electric shock collar. As already discussed many times, these methods
act to suppress behaviour instead of changing the behaviour and are highly
likely to exacerbate the behaviour thus making it worse.
The danger of aversive punishments is that it is often viewed as effective by dog owners who may see initial reductions in the undesired behaviour caused by distraction. In his book ‘Aggressive Behaviour in Dogs’ O’heare (2014) states; ‘in order for punishment to be effective in a behaviour change programme it must meet very rigid criteria which to most if not all dog trainers is practically impossible to achieve ergo any novice dog trainers have no hope of achieving desirable and safe results that will carry over the lifetime of the dog, more likely is that it will produce more intensive behavioural issues in the long run and also serious traumatic experiences for the dog.’ In addition it’s worth noting that a deterioration in behaviour can also result with even the most experienced of trainers as we do not always know the association the dog may make.
The book is
short but by following the recommended procedure one should have a dog that is
counter conditioned to look at the handler and avoid pulling towards other dogs
while on the lead. This is a good starting point but if you want a dog that is
happy to meet other dogs on the lead and on good terms then this book should be
considered as a first step in a longer and more holistic program.
