Socializing Puppies and Why it is Important
by Shara Slorstad
2008
Socializing your puppy with humans, animals and situations is extremely important. The more situations you introduce your puppy to the better off he will be as an adult. Dogs that were socialized properly as puppies are well developed and level headed. They don’t develop problems like anxiety and fear and they don’t become aggressive (unless there is an underlying medical problem). I’ve mentioned earlier than fear in dogs can be extremely dangerous and if a dog isn’t introduced to people, animals and situations properly he will become afraid of them because he doesn’t understand that they are something not to be feared.
There are different personality types for all dogs. Dogs that are more codependent than others are more likely to develop problems in a social setting if not introduced to them properly first. When a dog is overwhelmed and scared he can panic. Like most animals, dogs have a “flight or fight” instinct. Some animals are more likely to flight (herd animals, for example, like horses) and others, like dogs, are more likely to fight. A dog is also more likely to fight if he is on leash and therefore you have taken away his option to flee.
Like all things in dog training, preventing a problem from occurring in the first place is a lot easier than trying to fix it later. Especially when it comes to dogs with social problems.
How you socialize your puppy is also very important. You can just throw him into the middle of a busy crowd and expect him to deal with it perfectly fine, especially if he is of a weaker temperament (weaker meaning less headstrong; a weak temperament doesn’t necessarily mean a bad temperament).
Your puppies individual personality plays a big role, but did you know that puppies go through critical periods that will also affect their disposition and how they handle certain situations? Depending on how old your puppy is, he may deal with the same situation differently. This is why it’s important to understand these critical periods and when they occur so that you can best arm yourself to deal with it.
While the entire list of the critical periods for puppies does not deal with socialization, a good majority of it does. Because of this, and because it’s important to understand all of these stages (regardless of reason), I suggest reading the list
ABOVE.
So, based on the critical periods for puppies, the time that you bring your puppy into your home (which should be 7 or 8 weeks of age and no sooner) is during the “Human Socialization Period”. This is good because you want your puppy to bond with your family. The first few days that your puppy is in your house you don’t want to overwhelm him, so focus on bonding with the members of your family. Once you feel your pup has adjusted to his new home enough that he feels comfortable, is bonding with the humans in it, and is understanding that this is his new home you can start to socialize him with new people. Keep the visits positive and easy. You don’t want to throw him into a large crowd right away, but rather introduce him to one person at a time and then slowly build up to two, then three, then four etc.
The next period that occurs is the “Fear Impact” period. You’ll notice that it actually overlaps with the human socialization period. This is why you want to keep everything positive with your puppy. If he encounters a situation that is threatening and scary he will remember it forever and it can cause serious issues. He has very little confidence during this time and needs you to reassure him that new people and situations are okay. You want to avoid bad situations at all cost during this time, so don’t introduce him to an animal or person you know may be preserved as threatening or hurt him (you shouldn’t be introducing him to people that are going to hurt him anyway!).
During the “Seniority Classification” period is when your pup will suddenly gain confidence. He no longer needs you to constantly reassure him, in fact he may even try to challenge you! This is when more firm discipline may need to be introduced. You may find your pup is wandering off to explore more on his own and ignoring you when you try to get him to come. Things are less scary to your pup during this stage in his life so it is okay to introduce him to things that may have been perceived as threatening during the fear stage. He will be more brave now and these “big scary things” won’t leave a bad, lasting impression on him like they would have during the fear stage.
The “Flight Stage” will start to show now as your pup begins to ignore you more and more. He will become more defiant and this stage of life is very important on how you handle it. You need to not be as much of a push-over as you were during the fear impact stage, and be extremely persistent. Keep slowly introducing your pup to more and more things that hold “scarier” value.
Be careful during about 6 months of age because your pup will go from being an overly confident, defiant little brat, back to a coward who is codependent of you. This is the “Second Fear Impact” stage and, depending on when your pup entered the flight stage, may occur between 6 months of age and 14 months. It all completely depends on your puppy, which is why it is important to watch his reaction to new situations. If he no longer exuberantly investigates a new situation, and instead is displaying fear, you can take it as a pretty good hint that he’s entered the second fear impact stage. You need to be very patient during this time and treat it delicately. Don’t force your puppy to investigate whatever situation scares him. Let him figure it out on his own and at his own pace. Use kind words and encouragement.
A good way to encourage your pup to investigate a situation, without pushing him, is to first investigate it yourself. For example, when Linkin hit this stage at about 9 months old, we had one incident where we walked past the grocery store and a moving shopping cart scared him enough to hide behind my legs. I didn’t praise this behavior because I didn’t want to encourage the behavior he was displaying, but rather encourage him to investigate the shopping cart. I brushed it off and told him “you’re being silly Linkin!” and then, giving him slack to the five food lead he was on, I walked up to a shopping cart (while it stood still) and touched it myself. I was very careful about my investigation until he moved closer and sniffed it. Once I could see he was okay with this shopping cart being still, I moved it a little. He jumped back scared and I told him “It’s okay” and kept moving it until he investigated it again and then brushed it off like it was nothing. Since then he has never developed a fear of shopping carts and has no problem with them because I handled the situation appropriately based on which critical period he was currently in.
As an example of what not to do, again will use Linkin. When I was at Canada West Canine Centre (this was during Linkin’s second fear impact stage) I was hanging out with some classmates and their dogs after school. We each had chores to do on certain days and on this day one girl was vacuuming the training room. It was a large industrial vacuum cleaner, and Linkin had never actually been properly introduced to any type of vacuum. When she turned it on he spooked and hid behind her. I asked her to let me introduce him to it. I brought him over to the vacuum while it was one and this classmate held it still. He leaned forward on his tippy toes and began to sniff it. Although he was investigating it, which is good, he was obviously still not comfortable with it. While he was sniffing it she quickly moved it towards him to purposely scare him, and of course, it did. It’s taken me a year to get him use to our vacuum at home and he’s still quite wary of it because that one bad experience left a lasting impression. Needless to say, I was not impressed with my classmate.
Once your dog hits the “Maturity Stage” he should begin to feel comfortable with all situations around him. It may take up until he is 14 months old (as long as the second fear impact stage is predicted to last) until he starts to show more confidence and his personality will change into the dog he will be for the rest of his life. If you’ve introduced him properly to a variety of situations appropriately according to the critical period he was in, he should become a well developed dog with little to know fears that may create behavior problems.
Socialization is an ongoing process that will continue for the rest of your dogs life. While you will have to emphasize on it while he is younger, you can’t predict every single situation that your dog will encounter his whole life. When encountering new situations after your dog has hit the maturity stage you will have to deal with them in a calm manner and let your dog take his own time to investigate them.
If you discontinue socializing your dog once he has hit the maturity stage because you think he no longer needs it, he will slowly decline and become a socially awkward dog. He may develop fears he never had before or become aggressive to people or other animals. This is why it is important to continue socialization throughout his life.
Many people who want a guard dog think that simply not socializing them will create this guarding behavior that they want. This is simply not true. A dogs instinct is to guard his family (or “pack”) so a dog that is strongly bonded to his family and properly socialized will guard his home despite the fact he’s been well socialized. A guard dog that hasn’t been socialized will just be an aggressive dog. He won’t differentiate between a safe human entering your home and someone who is a threat. This is a serious risk both physically to the people involved and as a law suit. If you want a good guard dog for your home or business I suggest talking to a professional trainer and training your dog for this purpose. You will find that dogs trained in protection work are required to be well socialized and have a very stable temperament as well.
