Dog Sense

We plan to acquire a Labrador puppy in the near future and would also like to adopt a dog (breed and age undetermined) from the Humane Society. Can you advise on the ordering of these events, i.e., would it be preferable to bring the puppy into the household first or to allow the other dog to become part of the family before introducing a puppy? Thanks!

admin — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 16:27:36 +0000

Acquiring and socialising a new puppy takes time and dedicated effort, so my advice would be to complete this first – and wait until the puppy is four or five months old before looking for a rescue dog. Then check very carefully that the rescue dog is well socialized to puppies – because most dogs up for rehoming have little or no history, get the rehoming centre to check this out for you. To be doubly sure, before committing to a particular rescue dog, introduce it to your (now well socialised) puppy on neutral territory, and see how they get along.

The Humane Society has good advice on how to introduce dogs to one another at
http://www.humanesociety.org/animals/dogs/tips/introducing_new_dog.html, and Dr Sophia Yin’s e-book Perfect Puppy in 7 Days will give you everything you need to know about training and socializing your puppy – I recommend that you get this even if you’ve had a puppy before, because it’s got all the most up-to-date science-based information in it.

Is a dog’s personality more heavily influenced by genes or environment?

admin — Mon, 23 May 2011 20:02:07 +0000

Genes do form the foundation for much behaviour – dogs don’t behave much like cats, and vice-versa – but differences in personality between dogs are usually more the product of environment. It’s self-evident that some breeds of dog have distinctive behaviour, which therefore is likely to have a genetic foundation, but differences in personality cut across breeds and may only have a tenuous connection with genes. Personality is (by definition) something that is reasonably stable, and evident in many different circumstances. So, for example, greed is not a personality trait, because it’s only apparent when there’s food around, but timidity is, because it affects how a dog will react to almost anything that’s even slightly unfamiliar. Canine scientists are still undecided as to just how many different dimensions of personality dogs can have – estimates range between four and seven – but they’re agreed that personality is largely established in the first six months of life, and is powerfully influenced by the kind of environment that the puppy is brought up in.

Do dogs just have a severe case of Stockholm Syndrome?

admin — Fri, 20 May 2011 19:48:34 +0000

Stockholm Syndrome is a well-documented paradoxical phenomenon in which (human) hostages come to express empathy for their captors, and may even support them after release. There are a variety of psychological explanations for this, most of which revolve around a dependency for the captor that develops in the hostage some time after capture. Most dogs are undoubtedly psychologically dependent on their owners, but there, I think, the similarity ends. First of all, only about a quarter of human hostages exhibit signs of the Syndrome – the rest continue to express the negative feelings toward their captors that the rest of us would think of as logical. Second, being taken hostage is a highly traumatic and stressful experience, and it is thought that any reduction in this acute stress as the hostage situation progresses is an important trigger for the subsequent dependency. If dogs were prone to Stockholm Syndrome, then we might see hyper-dependency developing in dogs that are rehomed when adult – my research has shown that many dogs’ stress hormones go temporarily sky-high during rescue and rehoming. However (and contrary to some reports) there is no evidence that rehomed dogs, once they have settled in their new households, are any more likely to become over-dependent than dogs that stay with the same family all their lives.

I adopted a 5 yr old female shiba mix 6 months ago,recently spayed, has had litters, was a stray in CA. she is mostly interested in sniffing, eating, sleeping, and being petted by anyone/everyone. Wont play with toys or me or other dogs. How can I get her to be a joyful companion?

admin — Fri, 20 May 2011 19:44:36 +0000

It is never straightforward to explain the behavior of a dog that has been a stray: early-life experiences, especially traumatic ones, can produce profound and long-lasting distortions of what a dog finds rewarding and what it finds unpleasant. My guess here is that she was formerly starved (hence the food obsession, which I’ve seen in many other former strays) and also at some point was punished severely for playing. However, just because she isn’t exuberant doesn’t necessarily mean she’s not joyful; her life with you must be better than it was before. My advice is, first, be very careful never to punish her, since it’s likely that she is over-sensitive to punishment (try raising your hand slowly up alongside your shoulder – does she cower?). Given time and patience, you should be able to teach her to play again, by using shaping techniques. In a food-orientated dog, clicker training is a good way to achieve this: if you’re unsure how this works, and your behavior class can’t help, there are recommendations for books that will show you how to do this at the back of “Dog Sense”.

What can the recent, new research about wolves teach us about dogs?

admin — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 19:40:40 +0000

For wolves, the most important bonds are between members of a family, between offspring and parent, and these bonds are learned during the first few weeks of the cubs’ lives. Dogs are just the same – with the essential exception … Continue reading →

Where did dogs come from; are they really still wolves under the skin?

admin — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 19:37:07 +0000

Dogs did indeed come from wolves – but it’s important to realize that this happened many thousands of years ago, and the wolves then would not have been the same as the few that remain in the wild today. It’s … Continue reading →

Why are dogs so varied in appearance, demeanor, and size?

admin — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 19:36:40 +0000

Dogs are the most varied species of mammal on earth. This has been achieved by altering the rates at which various parts of the body develop, both before and after birth, so that some dogs, Pekingese for example, are more … Continue reading →

How do dogs learn from other dogs as well as their owners?

admin — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 19:36:17 +0000

The new canine science is gradually exposing the dog’s unique mind. In some ways they are smarter even than chimpanzees: for example, dogs are much more attentive to human gestures. In other ways they can seem to us to be rather limited, as in their understanding of the physical world. But they are very social creatures and very sensitive to the body language of other dogs and people, probably more so than we are ourselves. They also learn a lot from odors that we can’t detect; this is thought to be the way that specially trained dogs warn their owners of imminent epileptic or diabetic crises. They can learn by spontaneously imitating others’ actions, especially other dogs’, but we have no evidence yet that dogs actively teach one another.

What small changes can dog owners make to ensure they are supporting their relationship with their dog?

admin — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 19:35:56 +0000

The most important thing to bear in mind is that most dogs, like small children, are emotionally dependent on their owners. Many, therefore, hate to be left alone – they have little sense of time, and seem unable to reassure themselves with the idea that the separation will end eventually. Unless you can keep your dog with you 24/7, training your dog how to cope when it’s on its own is one of the kindest things you will ever do for it. (See page 175: “Home Alone: Can Dogs Be Trained to Cope?”

Why is physical punishment the wrong method to use when training a dog? What should be practiced instead?

admin — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 19:35:31 +0000

There are two reasons for objecting to physical punishment. The first is ethical – do owners have the right to hurt their dogs, even if it’s “for their own good”. The second is that physical punishment induces fear and anxiety – if it didn’t, it wouldn’t work – and these can affect the dog’s relationship with people and even its whole personality. And not in a good way.

Unless they’ve been mistreated in the past, most dogs want to please people, and their owners especially. Their behavior can thus be channeled by reward-based training – and if their attention wanders, the temporary withdrawal of reward can be used to bring them back in line. Reward-based training produces a confident, relaxed dog that knows what it should be doing. But training is essential – an unruly dog is a danger to itself and to others.