Monday Myth: My puppy is scared of the wheelie bin. If I pick him up and put him right next to it, he will surely see there’s nothing to worry about. Dogs often develop irrational fears. Or at least for us these fears are irrational. How else would you describe a fear of wheelie bins or paper bags? Unfortunately, deeming something “irrational” and trying to get our dog to “face his fear” (“Oh c’mon Barney, lets come closer to this paper bag you’re clearly terrified of, nothing to be scared of, eh?”) is not very helpful. Dogs don’t understand the world around them the way we do, and things that we consider normal can scare them and make them react. If your dog has never seen something before, and it looks and smells odd to him, it is in his best interest in term of survival to be wary of it and try to avoid it, unless, after repeated exposure, he decides that the object is not threatening and it’s fine to ignore it. So instead of forcing your puppy to go and sniff the wheelie bin, it’s much better to let him stay at a distance he is comfortable with and only approach if he decides that it’s safe to do so. If your dog has developed a fear of something because of a bad experience or inappropriate socialization and is convinced that something is going to hurt him or even poses danger to his life (e.g. other dogs, people, cars etc.) forcing him to “face his fear” is not only unethical (this approach, called “flooding” has long been abandoned in human behaviour therapy mainly due to ethical considerations) as it exposes your dog to very high levels of stress (some dogs if forced to “face their fear” will injure themselves trying to escape and lose control over their bowels such is their stress level and willingness to get away from the feared stimulus), but it’s effectiveness is also dubious. Rather than forcing our dogs to “stop being silly” and “get over it” we should try and understand that they are really, truly afraid of something and what we can do instead, if our dog’s fearful behaviour is having a great impact on their quality of life (e.g. makes him react aggressively towards dogs or people or makes it impossible to walk him in the rain etc.) it is only fair to implement positive rehabilitation methods, based on desensitization and counter conditioning, to slowly change your dog’s emotional response to something he is scared of from sheer terror to indifference or even pleasure. It’s so much kinder, more ethical and creates long lasting effects without putting your dog through a traumatic experience. If you ever get impatient with your shy or fearful dog and would just like him to “face his fears” think again. Imagine if someone dragged you towards something you are really, REALLY scared of – how would you feel? Don’t do the same to your dog.
Posted on: Mon, 09 Jun 2014 14:55:53 +0000