14 Ways to Stop Bad Dog Behaviors

Are You Struggling With "Bad" Dog Behaviors?

If you are struggling with "bad" dog behaviors, you are likely feeling helpless and may be wondering what to do. Well, I'm here to offer some tips and ideas!

Before considering several effective strategies to stop "bad" dog behaviors, it's important to remember that dogs don't behave badly just to drive us nuts.

Contrary to what you may have heard, dogs who misbehave aren't doing so "out of spite" or to assert dominance.

"No species in the animal kingdom creates dominance hierarchies with another species," explains board-certified veterinary behaviorist Dr. Amy Pike.

When dogs don’t do as asked, we must scratch off the possibility of an unfulfilled dominance hierarchy and consider other more probable causes, like the dog not clearly understanding what we are asking them to do or being too anxious or too distracted to do so.

Another consideration is that what humans consider to be problem behaviors, such as digging, barking, chewing, nipping, and jumping, are simply natural behaviors in dogs.

Dogs who engage in "bad behaviors" are often simply dogs who haven't been properly trained and, therefore, have not had an opportunity to learn what we would like to do instead.

With these considerations in mind, let's now address several strategies to decrease unwanted behaviors in dogs with the use of harmful, punishment-based dog training techniques.

1. Firstly, Steer Clear From Bad Advice

Many dog owners seek ways to stop bad dog behaviors, but it's unfortunate that they often stumble upon bad advice that may not only be ineffective but may be downright harmful in the long run.

It can be tempting for dog owners to physically correct their dogs to stop bad behavior and vent their frustration and resentment at having a dog that engages in undesirable behaviors. However, these methods are likely to backfire.

According to a year-long survey of dog owners using confrontational methods to address bad behaviors in dogs, veterinary researchers have found that such methods do little to correct the improper behavior and can even elicit aggressive responses!

Therefore, advice to physically correct a dog, such as by hitting or kicking, shaking the dog, staring the dog down, or performing an alpha roll or scruff shake, risks eliciting an aggressive response in the dog.

Even engaging in more innocent looking corrections such as physically forcing a dog to release an item from his mouth or staring the dog down can cause dogs to respond aggressively.

Rather than focusing on stopping the behavior by using punitive methods, consider embracing positive reinforcement, the best training method according to research.

2. Avoid Falling Into the "No" Trap

Many dog owners are tempted to use the word "no" every time the dog engages in bad behavior. As verbal beings, it can be difficult for us to refrain from showing our displeasure by using a word so commonly employed.

However, saying "no" to our dogs is a practice that is frowned upon. And it's not because dogs don't speak our language. Often, behavior specialists discourage using it with children.

The main reason why saying no is judged so poorly is because this simple word fails to teach children and dogs what we want them to do instead.

On top of this, many behaviors in dogs that are considered "bad" stem from a deep need for attention. Therefore, saying "no" to attention-seeking dogs will still qualify as attention, even if it's negative attention.

Here are more problems associated with the word no: 7 problems with teaching the dog "no."

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3. Intervene Before the Bad Behavior Escalates

Stopping bad behavior early on is important. As the saying goes, "nip it in the bud."

If you catch that wild glimpse on your puppy's face denoting his intent to grab your pant legs and bite, intervene before he actually latches on. You'll have a better chance of redirecting your puppy's nipping behavior versus once he has attached and is vigorously shaking his head.

Right before he attaches is a good time to wiggle that flirt pole or toss a ball the opposite way to redirect his intent. Or you can just toss him kibble (that you always keep ready in your pocket or treat bag) so that rather than nipping, he'll be playing a game of "catch the kibble."

Tackling problematic behaviors early on is also important to prevent them from establishing. If you allow a dog to rehearse a problematic behavior over and over, it will put roots and become more difficult to eradicate compared to addressing it right away.

Moral of the story? Seek help for a behavior at its earliest onset, right when it very first happens. This helps to lower the chances of an established rehearsal history.

4. Understand the Function of Your Dog's Behavior

Behavior is just something any living being does. As mentioned, many dog behaviors that we label as "bad" are rather normal, natural dog behaviors. Dogs dig, dogs bark, dogs try to gain access to food.

Dogs who behave "badly" are often untrained and ones who haven't learned to control their impulses. Sort of like a child who hasn't learned manners yet.

The Power of Reinforcement

Behavior doesn't happen in a vacuum, it doesn't just happen for no rhyme nor reason. If a dog persists in bad behavior, there's likely some type of reinforcement to maintain it. "Bad" behaviors in dogs take place for two main reasons: to gain access to something desirable and to avoid something undesirable.

Gaining Access to Something Desirable

The dog engages in a particular behavior to gain access to something desirable or do something that satisfies an inner need (counter surfing to get food, barking to get attention, digging to search for underground critters).

Any behavior that allows your dog access to something he desires and, therefore, provides a pleasant consequence will strengthen and repeat. That's the power of positive reinforcement!

Avoiding Something Undesirable

In this case, the dog engages in a particular behavior to escape or avoid an unpleasant situation (e.g., running away when it's bath time, hiding under the bed when scared, biting when the collar is attempted to be placed on, growling when the kids try to pick up the dog). Any behavior that allows your dog to avoid an unpleasant situation will strengthen and repeat. That's the power of negative reinforcement.

Problems With Misinterpretation

Understanding the exact function of a dog's problematic behavior can help pinpoint the exact strategy to implement to attain a higher success rate.

This is why behavior professionals rely on functional behavior assessments and functional analysis. Once the exact function of the behavior becomes apparent, it is possible to develop the best interventions to reduce its occurrence.

For example, a client of mine was tired of her Labrador's barking when she came home from work. The barking annoyed her and her neighbors. She assumed this barking occurred because her dog was angry at her for not taking him along and was seeking "revenge." Her neighbor told her that she abruptly stopped her Yorkie's barking by spraying her with a water gun.

So, my client decided to try it with her Labrador. At that point, she came to me, desperate because her dog now barked even more intensely and at a higher pitch, even when she sprayed him with water!

As she showed me, all I could see was a dog having fun with the water and barking to get her to spray him more!

Labs are notorious for liking water, so this dog was barking in a high-pitched barking to manifest a desire to play. By spraying him for barking, she was actually reinforcing her dog rather than punishing him!

On top of this, had she known that her Labrador's initial barking was due to seeking attention, a different, more successful approach could have been instituted.

Spraying with water instead provided a double whammy of reinforcement: being showered with water and being showered with attention. No wonder he was barking more!

Want another example? Joe the beagle growls when guests pat him on the head. The owner has therefore started putting him in a time-out area every time he growls. Yet, visit after visit, the growling doesn't decrease.

Chances are, Joe is growling because he's not comfortable being touched by the visitors, so when put in time out, he feels relief. By putting him in time out the owner is reinforcing the growling!

5. Use Management to Prevent Rehearsal

Whether you are planning on hiring a professional to help out (scroll down for more info about the importance of this in certain cases) or you want to try working on the issue on your own, as mentioned, it's important to prevent rehearsal of the problem behavior (you can this through the use of management) as you plan to work on the behavior modification strategy. Also, you want to use management when you cannot actively work on the issue.

Management entails taking steps to prevent the behavior from occurring in the place, or at least preventing it from escalating to its more intense form.

For example, if your dog jumps up on people visiting your home, for the time being, you can install a baby gate when guests are over so he can no longer jump on them. Or, if your dog tends to countersurf when you are cooking, you should keep him out of the kitchen until he learns better manners.

6. Set Your Dog for Success

Knowledge is ultimately power when it comes to modifying a dog's bad behavior. If you can predict when a dog's bad behavior is likely to occur, you can take some steps to prevent it and help set the dog up for success.

I love it when dog owners tell me something along the lines of: "Every time I do this, my dog does that, how can I change his behavior?" Why? Because through this contingency we can predict when the behavior happens, and that gives us more control over it.

For example, the other day, a new puppy owner contacted me and told how badly her puppy bites at the end of the day, in the evening. It got so bad that she was wondering whether there was such a thing as a "puppy witching hour."

The owner reported to me that she had tried everything to tire her puppy out so as to reduce the pup's hyper behavior and biting. She was always doing the same routine. Walking her puppy, giving him an interactive toy, playing a game of fetch and then doing some training. No matter what, right around the same time in the evening, her puppy would start nipping at her like crazy.

What was going on with this puppy? Simple: the puppy was exhausted! Just like toddlers, puppies need their restorative sleep and puppies can get cranky when they are overtired.

How did we solve the problem? By arranging an earlier bedtime and creating a quiet, soothing area for the puppy to catch some ZZZs.

7. Make Triggers Less Salient

It is very important to keep your dog under threshold by making triggers less salient. For example, if your dog barks when you both walk by other dogs, you can make things much easier by increasing distance. With more distance, your dog's barking may decrease as the trigger is made less salient.

Here's another example: If your dog steals food from your countertop, keep the food farther away, maybe out of reach from the edge, so that he can't grasp it easily.

The goal is to alter the physical environment in a way that is most likely to alter the problem behavior.

So, if your dog reacts to the doorbell or any other sound, you can record the triggering sound and play it at a level that doesn't cause your dog to react much. Then, you can work on such exposures, gradually increasing the intensity. Even better, pair these low-level exposures with a tasty treat!

8. Take Baby Steps

Often, as dog owners, we expect quick results from our dogs and, therefore, risk progressing too fast in their training.

"Be a splitter and not a lumper," said world-renowned animal trainer Bob Bailey. This means breaking whatever you are training your dog to do into small, assimilable steps rather than taking big steps. This will help your dog succeed.

For example, if you are struggling with your puppy crying when you leave him alone in the crate, don't expect him to get used to being in the crate without you overnight.

Rather, take several small steps by keeping him in the crate alone for a few seconds as you go grab something in another room, then progress a little more and more every time. These baby steps are meant to desensitize your puppy.

Desensitization is a behavior modification process where the dog is exposed to his triggers or situations in which he feels unease in a systematic way so that he isn't over threshold.

Every now and then, make sure to mix in some brief absences with your longer ones so that your puppy doesn't predict an increase in difficulty as you progress.

Always monitor how things go. If your puppy is struggling when you leave for a full minute, that's a sign he is not ready to deal with that long of an absence. Take a few steps back and work on briefer absences and don't move to longer ones until he seems comfortable with the shorter ones.

Slow and steady wins the race when it comes to modifying behavior!

9. Create Positive Associations

Along with baby steps, you may want to create positive associations. So, back to your puppy crying when you leave him in the crate; try to give him something tasty to eat in the crate while you are leaving. This will teach him that great things happen when you are away.

If he doesn't eat the treat, take that as a sign that he's too over threshold, and once again, you are progressing too quickly.

Counterconditioning is the term used to depict the process of creating positive associations in dogs so as to change their emotional response. It works best when implemented along with desensitization (baby steps, low-level exposures).

Trial after trial, as your puppy associates you leaving with some tasty goodies, he may start going from dreading you leaving to looking forward to it because it has become a predictor of good things.

The same can be done with other behavior problems, such as dogs who bark at other dogs because they are uneasy about them. If you present a treat every time your dog sees a dog, as done in the "look at that dog game," you can work on changing his emotional response.

Trial after trial, when behavior modification is implemented correctly, you should see glimpses of what is known as a "conditioned emotional response." Basically, more relaxed, happier body language.

10. Teach an Alternate Behavior

Once you have identified the function of the behavior, you can teach an alternate behavior. What behavior would you like your dog to perform instead of the problematic one?

For example, back to the Labrador who barked at the owner for attention: this dog could be trained to engage in an alternate behavior to gain attention (e.g. targeting her hand or performing a trick) while any barking is preempted and ignored so as to decrease the likelihood of it being reinforced with attention.

With time, since the alternate behavior is reinforced while the barking is prevented or ignored when it happens, you should see an increase in the alternate behavior. This behavior change method is called differential reinforcement of alternative behavior (DRA).

It may be less work-intensive to use as an alternate behavior, a behavior that is already in the dog's behavior repertoire.

In other words, using behavior that the dog can already engage in and that can be used to “compete” and therefore substitute the undesirable behavior.

For example, if a dog already knows how to sit, he can be asked to sit right before his food bowl is lowered instead of having him jump on the owner at mealtime.

11. Measure Your Success

If you are diligent and consistent, after some time of applying your behavior intervention plan, you should start seeing some steady improvement. Keep track of it. You should notice a gradual and steady advancement.

Perhaps instead of constantly biting your leg, you may notice that your puppy is playing more with that special toy. Or perhaps you start noticing that your dog isn't barking at the top of his lungs every time you walk by a dog. Or maybe he's no longer pulling on the leash as much.

It goes without saying that if you do not notice any improvement despite your diligence, or if things go well and then suddenly decline and fail to improve again, you may need to take a few steps back and reevaluate what may be going wrong. A troubleshooting plan should be in place to better understand what the issue is.

12. Take a Holistic Approach

It will be difficult to change a dog's behavior if we don't consider other parts of the dog's life. So, look at your whole dog to evaluate how things are going in his life.

For example, if you have a dog who has never walked, he'll likely be a ball full of energy, and it may be difficult for him to listen to you when his body is telling him to get rid of all this pent-up energy.

If your dog is stressed by constant noises or the kids never give him a break to lie down and rest, you can bet he'll start getting stressed and antsy, and this can lead to behavior problems. Dogs need their daily naps, and they need to learn to relax.

Dogs need exercise, walks, socialization, and training, and we also need to consider adding some mental stimulation to keep those doggy brains busy. No, this doesn't mean your dog needs to do crossword puzzles or Sudoku; it just means that dogs should be provided opportunities to exercise their brain through food puzzles, foraging opportunities, and brain games, which can be as tiring as exercise sometimes.

13. Exclude Medical Problems

It is important to consider that, sometimes, behaviors that are labeled as "bad" actually stem from underlying medical problems.

Suspect this in particular if your dog has been well-behaved for most of his life, and now, out of the blue, he is growling when you pet him or he has started to steal food from the table and raid the trash can.

A dog growling when you pet him may be suffering from an underlying ear infection, a pinched nerve in the dog's neck, or some other painful condition that can make him particularly grumpy.

A dog who suddenly starts stealing food from the table or gets into the waste bin may be suffering from some disorder that may increase his appetite, such as Cushing's disease or diabetes, or you may be dealing with a side effect of certain medications (steroids).

Hypothyroidism is just one of the many medical conditions known to cause aggression in dogs. Recently, a study has also found that skin allergies in dogs can trigger behavior changes, so it's important to factor in a dog's physical well-being.

It would be extremely important to have medical conditions ruled out so that a behavioral intervention plan is not implemented needlessly to the detriment of the dog and dog owner.

14. Consult With a Behavior Professional

While some dog behaviors can be readily managed or fixed, others may be more challenging. Changing dog behavior requires skill, and you may want to avoid incurring some common dog behavior modification mistakes that may cause setbacks and heartaches.

For behavior problems, your best bet is to consult with a board-certified veterinary behaviorist or a certified applied animal behaviorist.

Please note: unless the behavior professional has a doctorate-level graduate degree, he/she shouldn't use the term "behaviorist" but should rather use the term "behavior consultant, behavior counselor, or behavior specialist."

If you decide to work with a dog trainer or behavior consultant, please ensure that they use positive and humane behavior modification techniques.

Wrapping It Up

Stopping your dog from behaving badly doesn't have to be a battle of wills. By understanding why your dog behaves the way he does and using dog-friendly, positive reinforcement techniques, you can help your dog learn what is expected of him and develop new behavior patterns that aren't problematic.

Be patient and consistent, and don't hesitate to enlist the help of a behavior professional if needed. This can save you time and frustration. Addressing behavior problems early on is important so that they develop into deeply ingrained habits that are more challenging to overcome.

And remember: dogs don't engage in "bad" behaviors out of spite. Like children, they simply need gentle guidance and training to learn what we expect of them.

References

• Guilherme-Fernandes J, Olsson IAS, Vieira de Castro AC. Do aversive-based training 756 methods actually compromise dog welfare?: A literature review. Appl Anim Behav Sci. 2017; 757 196, 1-12.
• Vieira de Castro AC, Fuchs D, Pastur S, et al. Does training method matter?: Evidence for the negative impact of aversive-based methods on companion dog welfare. bioRxiv 2019:1-34

If your puppy or dog shows signs of potential aggression (lunging, barking, growling, snapping, biting), please consult with a dog behavior professional for direct in-person guidance. Articles, videos, and general information provided online are not meant to replace in-person training/instruction. By using this service, you are waiving any liability claims or other types of claims related to any of your dogs' behaviors against you or others.

© 2024 Adrienne Farricelli CPDT-KA, Dip.CBST