Have you ever wondered what's going on in your aggressive dog's mind? Are they just naturally mean or is there a deeper emotional struggle at play? This episode of Dog Aggression Answers reveals the misunderstood side of your dog's aggressive behavior. We focus not just on the obvious growling, lunging or biting, but we delve into the inner fears and anxieties that fuel these actions. Just like humans, dogs too have emotional lives. And the fear that triggers their aggressive behavior can lead to long-term stress impacting their overall health.
Join us as we uncover the parallels between the emotional lives of dogs and humans, and how fear and stress can affect their behavior and physical health. We also share insights on how to help your dog navigate stressful situations and improve their emotional wellbeing. This isn’t just about stopping the aggression, it's about understanding our dogs better and helping them lead happier, more comfortable lives. Remember, it’s not just about stopping your dog’s aggression, but also improving their emotional wellbeing. The change you want to see in your dog starts with understanding their fears. So tune in, and let’s make a difference in your dog's life.
About Scott Sheaffer Scott Sheaffer, CCBC-KA, CDBC, CPDT-KA, is a certified dog behavior consultant who has worked with thousands of dog owners and their aggressive dogs. Scott specializes in the assessment and treatment of fear, anxiety, aggression, and phobias in dogs six months and older.
Disclaimer If you have a dog who is aggressive and dangerous to humans, it is important that you immediately consult directly with an experienced and certified canine behavior consultant who specializes in dog aggression to humans. Take proper measures to ensure that your dog is never in a position to injure anyone. The information presented in this podcast is for educational purposes only and is neither intended nor implied to replace the need for the direct involvement of an experienced and certified canine behavior consultant who specializes in dog aggression to humans. Scott Sheaffer, the Grumpy Dogs podcast and USA Dog Behavior, LLC, are not liable for any incidents or outcomes resulting from following the advice given in this podcast.
Have you ever wondered what's going on in your aggressive dog's mind? Are they just naturally mean or is there a deeper emotional struggle at play? This episode of Dog Aggression Answers reveals the misunderstood side of your dog's aggressive behavior. We focus not just on the obvious growling, lunging or biting, but we delve into the inner fears and anxieties that fuel these actions. Just like humans, dogs too have emotional lives. And the fear that triggers their aggressive behavior can lead to long-term stress impacting their overall health.
Join us as we uncover the parallels between the emotional lives of dogs and humans, and how fear and stress can affect their behavior and physical health. We also share insights on how to help your dog navigate stressful situations and improve their emotional wellbeing. This isn’t just about stopping the aggression, it's about understanding our dogs better and helping them lead happier, more comfortable lives. Remember, it’s not just about stopping your dog’s aggression, but also improving their emotional wellbeing. The change you want to see in your dog starts with understanding their fears. So tune in, and let’s make a difference in your dog's life.
About Scott Sheaffer Scott Sheaffer, CCBC-KA, CDBC, CPDT-KA, is a certified dog behavior consultant who has worked with thousands of dog owners and their aggressive dogs. Scott specializes in the assessment and treatment of fear, anxiety, aggression, and phobias in dogs six months and older.
Disclaimer If you have a dog who is aggressive and dangerous to humans, it is important that you immediately consult directly with an experienced and certified canine behavior consultant who specializes in dog aggression to humans. Take proper measures to ensure that your dog is never in a position to injure anyone. The information presented in this podcast is for educational purposes only and is neither intended nor implied to replace the need for the direct involvement of an experienced and certified canine behavior consultant who specializes in dog aggression to humans. Scott Sheaffer, the Grumpy Dogs podcast and USA Dog Behavior, LLC, are not liable for any incidents or outcomes resulting from following the advice given in this podcast.
Scott Sheaffer, CBCC-KA, CDBC, CPDT-KA:
Welcome to the Dog Aggression Answers podcast. I'm your host, scott Schaefer. Most of the clients that come to me with dogs who are aggressive to other dogs and who are aggressive to humans either one or both are, understandably, almost totally focused on their dogs barking, growling, lunging and biting that they're doing to humans or dogs. These kinds of behaviors, of course, are very concerning, which is why they're at my doorstep. However, there are a small handful of clients with dogs like these who come to me and say something like the following Scott, every time my dog barks at a stranger when they enter our home and every time that he barks at another dog when we are out on a walk, I have to think that maybe my dog must really be miserable at some level. How could he possibly be happy and comfortable when he feels like he has to do this all the time? These clients are absolutely asking the right question. There is so much more to dog aggression than just the outward presentation of scary behaviors such as barking, growling, lunging and biting, and I know these are the things that we want to get under control, but, as we've talked about before, those behaviors are simply a symptom of a bigger problem. In today's episode we're going to talk about an aggressive dog's inner life and how it affects them and how it affects successful treatment. I cannot emphasize enough that, just as you can't judge a book by its cover, you likewise cannot judge an aggressive dog by just their outward behaviors. There's an inner life. There's always so much more to the story. This is one of my favorite topics when it comes to dog aggression. Stay tuned. Hi, I'm Scott Schaefer and you're listening to the Dog Aggression Answers podcast. I've worked with thousands of aggressive dogs and their owners and I'm certified by two international certifying organizations in dog behavior. In this podcast series, I'll explain why your dog is acting aggressively and provide recognized, science-based answers things you can do to make things better. Understanding and addressing your dog's aggression will make living with your dog better and, let's not forget, improve your dog's life too.
Scott Sheaffer, CBCC-KA, CDBC, CPDT-KA:
Let's first quickly review why some dogs are aggressive to other dogs or to humans they don't know. Please see some of my earlier episodes for more of a drill done on this but basically it's because they are afraid of these triggers. That is to say, they want the approaching human they don't know or the other dog they are unsure of to stay away from them. 90% of dogs who have these fears use aggression to make these triggers stay away. In other words, offense is the best defense. Unfortunately, because almost all of these triggers stay away from them after they bark, growl, lunge, the behavior is reinforced with the aggressive dog and tends to get worse. In other words, my aggression worked. I feel better. I'm gonna do that again, but notice, I said 90% of dogs use aggression to keep scary things away. The other 10% use avoidance to create distance from the scary trigger. In other words, they move away from the trigger to create distance and therefore feel safer.
Scott Sheaffer, CBCC-KA, CDBC, CPDT-KA:
A key thing to remember here is that whether your dog uses aggression or avoidance around human or dog triggers, the motivation is exactly the same. And what is that motivation? Fear. Everything we talk about in this episode also applies to dogs that use avoidance that we talked about just a second ago. In these, what are scary to the dog situations, as I like to say, aggression is not the problem. It's a symptom. The root cause is the real problem we need to work with, with the dog, and the root cause is fear. Work on reducing the fear and the symptoms that is, the aggression or avoidance will improve. But aggression or avoidance are what we see in the dog.
Scott Sheaffer, CBCC-KA, CDBC, CPDT-KA:
What's going on with the dog's emotional state? While we can't prove it empirically, almost all certified dog behavior consultants are confident that dogs do have emotional lives. Why do I and others think that? Here's a few reasons. One, the neurotransmitters and hormones in dogs that regulate their emotional and mental lives are virtually identical to those found in humans. The second reason I believe that dogs do in fact have emotional lives is that the behavioral medications used to treat problematic dog behaviors are frequently the same exact medications used to treat similar human problem behaviors the exact same medications. And the third reason I think that dogs do in fact have emotional lives is that the layout of the canine brain is very similar to that of a human brain, with similar regions. Mri studies of dogs versus human brains show that dog brains and human brains react in very similar ways to stimuli. A stimulus applied to a dog and a human light up the same regions of their brains. Very, very interesting.
Scott Sheaffer, CBCC-KA, CDBC, CPDT-KA:
In addition to the evidence I just cited, anyone who has worked with dogs knows there is more going on in a dog's head than just eating and sleeping. I would argue that anyone who has owned a lot of dogs, or anyone who has a lot of dog experience knows this same thing. They have emotional lives, including the same observable emotions that humans have, including anxiety, depression, panic, phobias and so on. It's a dog's emotional life that makes the human canine bond so strong. We just get one another. It's why we are drawn to dogs and they are drawn to us. Here's a fact for you the majority of pet dogs prefer to be with humans over other dogs. I think that's fascinating and I certainly observe it all the time.
Scott Sheaffer, CBCC-KA, CDBC, CPDT-KA:
Since we know that dogs who are aggressive are also fearful, it's not much of a leap to assume that they are also not too happy. I don't know about you, but when I'm fearful I don't feel too great. It's uncomfortable, and when I'm scared about something for an extended period, for example the loss of a loved one or a loved one's serious illness, it can really wear on me. It takes a mental and even physical toll. Dogs are no different. Long-term stress creates more of the stress hormone cortisol in dogs, just like it does in humans. Constantly being exposed to triggers takes its toll. To make things worse, dogs with fear and anxiety also experience hypervigilance. Hypervigilance simply means that the dog is constantly on the lookout for scary things in the environment. Just be prepared. The dog is thinking, just in case. As you can imagine, hypervigilance is also stressful and exhausting to a fearful dog. Just humans can also experience hypervigilance.
Scott Sheaffer, CBCC-KA, CDBC, CPDT-KA:
I don't know if you've picked this up in this podcast series and these individual episodes, but isn't it fascinating how much the emotional states, the body language, the neurotic behaviors of dogs parallel that of humans? That's why when you're a dog behavior consultant, you spend a lot of time Studying human behavior. It's called comparative psychology because they are so similar. It's just really cool. No longer I do this, the more I realize that.
Scott Sheaffer, CBCC-KA, CDBC, CPDT-KA:
So what are we saying here? We're saying that, yes, dogs who are aggressive are stressed, fearful, anxious and can even be phobic. That is a recipe for unhappiness for any species, both dogs and humans. Every dog experiences this differently and two different degrees. The constant exposure to stress like this makes behavior modification more difficult and can even cause physical issues with a dog. One of the very first things I do with clients who have aggressive dogs is to instruct them to keep their dog as far away as Possible from triggers, typically dog or human. We don't want the fearful dog to constantly be rehearsing the fear, aggression response. It can make the fear worse in their dog and behavior modification more difficult. It can make the dog more chronically stressed and it can make the aggressive behaviors worse as well, because the reinforcement feedback cycle that starts.
Scott Sheaffer, CBCC-KA, CDBC, CPDT-KA:
Please know that your dog's aggression is just an observable and outward Manifestation of the emotional state they are experiencing inside. They are most likely not happy and, just like as is true with humans, the stress they experience around triggers extends beyond those moments and has a cumulative effect on them and, as you can guess, it's not a good one. There are a lot of reasons to get help for your aggressive dog. This episode added another one. Do it for your dog's emotional well-being. Yes, you want the aggression to stop, of course, but it's also important that their emotional life improves too. They will become a better and happier pet for you.
Scott Sheaffer, CBCC-KA, CDBC, CPDT-KA:
Continue your work with your dog's aggression through the combination of the information in this podcast series and or the help of a certified dog behavior consultant, always keeping in mind that your work helps with the aggressive behaviors but also can improve your dog's emotional well-being, as we've been talking about in this episode. As you can imagine, one can help the other. We will continue our look into aggression and how it affects our dogs and families. In upcoming episodes, we'll also be looking into remedial actions that you can take. Please continue to send your notes and messages to me. You can do this by clicking on the buttons at the bottom of the dog aggression answers dot-com landing page. Thanks for listening. If you haven't already, please subscribe to this podcast on any of the popular podcast players. There are a couple of buttons at the bottom of the landing page, as I mentioned earlier on dog aggression answers dot-com, if you'd like to leave me a message and I always, of course, love getting those and I try to answer all messages and appreciate your input.
Scott Sheaffer, CBCC-KA, CDBC, CPDT-KA:
Before I sign off, I want to remind you that the information presented in this podcast is for educational purposes only. If you have a dog who is aggressive and dangerous to humans or animals, please consult directly with a certified dog behavior consultant who specializes in dog aggression. Always take proper measures to ensure that your dog is never in a position to injure any human or animal. Thanks for listening. Thank you for joining me today. Before you go, please subscribe if you haven't already. If not for yourself, do it for your dog. If you find these episodes helpful, please leave a review. I'll see you next time as we continue your journey of addressing your dog's aggression. Now go hug your dog.