The importance of early socialization

This week, I met a dog who is a good reminder of how important early socialization is to a dog's development. He is 10 years old and scared of children and strange adults. He growls, snaps and has bitten when interaction with a "scary" person was forced. This boy has had these fear-based issues since he was a puppy. He didn't get to meet a lot of people, and his only experience with children was the neighbor kids who teased him when he was tethered outside.

Puppies go through a couple of important stages of psychological development, much like human children. The primary period occurs before most puppies even go to their new homes, while they are still with their breeder, mother and siblings (hopefully). The secondary period is under six months of age or so. Socialization refers to meeting hundreds of strange people and dogs (of all breeds, large & small), and experiencing lots of different types of situations. Often, people don't realize how involved it really is to make sure their puppy is well socialized and learns to tolerate new, novel situations and bounce back or recover quickly from surprises. Pups should meet hundreds of people of all shapes, sizes, genders, and skin colors, wearing all kinds of clothes - bulky jackets, big hats, sunglasses, with and without facial hair, etc. The more they meet while young, the better they will do as adults.

It's also important for puppies to meet children of all ages, and that these meetings be closely supervised (meaning that an adult is within reach of both the child and the dog) to make sure that neither the puppy nor the child has a scary experience which could scar them for life. Children do all of the things that put dogs on edge - they scream and make crazy high pitched noises, flail around, run... all the things that scare a dog or trigger prey drive. Children need to learn how to behave safely around dogs (be a tree - rooted in place, fold the limbs in, look at the ground rather than staring at the dog) and dogs need to learn that children are not as scary as they seem. Desensitization and counter-conditioning are important in helping puppies to become comfortable, and means starting with the children at a distance, while feeding the puppy yummy treats to help create a positive emotional association with the presence of kids. Eventually, the puppy should be able to listen to obedience commands while the kids are nearby. Dogs need to learn to not only tolerate, but look forward to children because they predict good things (yummy treats, fun games, etc).

If a dog has missed out on early socialization, it leaves them at a huge disadvantage in dealing with life in a human world. Every new experience could be scary or anxiety-ridden. When scary situations are combined (e.g., the presence of a child, plus food in the dog's dish), this increases the likelihood that a bite will occur. This is not to say that older dogs cannot work through their fear issues, but it does take much more effort to help adult dogs overcome socialization deficits to be less fearful. It can take months of systematic counter-conditioning and desensitization. After all, adult dogs may have been practicing the fearful behavior for years. My aggression assessment this week was a great reminder of how true the old saying "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" really is.