Dog aggression for dog owners
What is aggression and how can we prevent it? Aggression can come in many forms, which I will describe later below, but many people view aggression when their dog is displaying dangerous behavior that has been going on for a short time or for the life of the dog. Unfortunately, what can happen is that many owners don’t know there are ways to help this behavior. Ultimately, most true aggression that is inherently brought down cannot be taken out of the dog but more so controlled with proper training and environmental control. Even sometimes medication under the direct care of a veterinarian can help.
Most of the time aggression stems from fearful experiences, lack of socializing while the dog has become defensive and with over time the dog has learned what works for them, which is by lunging out to other dogs, people, bikes, cars, even children. It’s not often but it does happen is that the dog can even be aggressive towards their owners whether it’s about food, grooming, furniture, or toys, which can result in bites, infections, and turmoil in the household. Hundreds of dogs yearly get put down (euthanized) due to this. We need to not shame the owners but let them know if training and behavior modification can be done at the start of these issues, we don’t have to put the dogs down.
Medication for dogs
Owners have been led to think that just medication itself will resolve these issues when in fact it can have little effect in the long run. And there isn’t enough data to show how the dogs respond on a mental and physical level because the blood work, daily and weekly checkup, behavior studies throughout the process and long-term outcome haven’t been locked down to have hard evidence. We can see short term effects and HOPE the medication is working and we can also assume the owners are saying what they believe the medication is working, but that’s a placebo effect at its finest. We need to do the combination of obedience, behavior modification and medication just as if a human is trying to seek help for trauma…. They need all the effective devices used in short- and long-term treatment.
Below are the more common types of aggression that was well written by the VCA that I highly recommend owners reading and looking into that I have experienced many times in the past 21 years training aggressive dogs. I also strongly encourage owners to do their research on hiring a qualified, experienced trainer in their area that has had countless times working with truly aggressive dogs, not just scared dogs, but truly aggressive dogs.
This doesn’t go to say that we can save them all. I have met some truly disturbed dogs that just weren’t fixable, and it’s heartbreaking but it’s the truth. They are a great danger to everyone around them and they were too far gone or mentally unsound for training.
What can cause aggression?
What causes aggression and why does it happen? There are many types of aggressions and why they happen. However, before deciding what type of aggression your dog has, please seek professional help from a qualified dog trainer in your area that KNOWS different type of aggressions. It takes years to know how to read, train and maintain dogs with aggression.
First, we have what's commonly known as Anti-social or social conflict aggression. When this happens, a dog has not been properly introduced to medium or higher levels of environmental simulation and needs to have a training process that slowly lets them learn coping skills. This can take weeks to years to develop. Then we have territorial aggression. A lot of owners may think that a dog is being protective on their property, which in some cases may be true, but true territorial animals are quiet, predatory instincts happen and the dog wants to teach the intruder a lesson by attacking it.
Less common types of aggression
Pain-induced aggression can happen suddenly and "out of nowhere" as a lot of owner’s state. Dogs can be very stoic animals and there can be pain hidden. When the wrong movement happens on them or towards them, they can lash out in biting. I do not think this is a true type of aggression, I believe it is a response to what can be changed, but it is under a type of aggression.
Disease related aggression can almost have the same description as Pain related aggression because the aggression is body related and comes from a control situation that can be resolved. If anyone has ever had an illness or injury, we are not always the funniest to be around. This type of aggression isn't instinctual, behavioral, or caused on a mental level. So, are we treating the pain that caused the aggression? However, we can train a dog that's territorial aggressive and that came truly from the dog.
Maternal aggression, I believe, is the most dangerous. Not only is it purely instinctual but almost non-reversible. You can gain the trust of a dog to be around her puppies, but that level of hell has fury aggression from a mother will always be there.
Not typical but not unheard of aggression
Possessive aggression can have a few categorizations as to why dogs have this level of aggression. We can look at breed reasons, age, what are they being possessive of, was this a learned behavior, had the dog experienced someone that backed off and truly aren't aggressive? There are many factors that need to be accounted for and an experienced trainer needs to know how to handle this.
Last, there is Redirected Aggression. Again, we can slice these a thousand ways and see if we can really call it aggression. Redirected means the behavior came from a different source and the dog's response was the bite/ lunge. If the dog is frustrated about another dog across the street and can get to the other dog and it turns can snaps/ bites the owner, how will this be perceived? This can also be perceived as anxiety and it looks like aggression. There's a lot of factors that need to be questioned and processed before making a correct determination of how the training protocol needs to be made.
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