Okay, but can we stop ascribing complex emotions and actions that require human level cognition to dogs in our welfare posts? There was a rather good anecdotal account of how a person’s use of Cesar Millan’s tactics ruined their relationship with their first dog, and for the most part it was a good and enlightening read. However one line did kind of stick in my craw. I can’t find the post now but it was along the lines of:
“And then my dog started to deliberately disobey me on walks.”
And this is, unfortunately, a sign of potentially damaging anthropomorphism. Dogs are not capable of being vindictive or malicious, and assuming that the dog’s lack of response to commands was due to him bearing a grudge about the harshness of previous treatment is entirely the wrong interpretation to take away. It is true that the dog’s inability to properly carry out commands is due to the aversive training techniques, HOWEVER, it did not turn the dog into a petulant three year old human.
Most likely the dog is not able to understand that you want him to perform a task because until recently your behaviour towards him consisted of random jabs, hisses, and other uncomfortable stimuli, probably in tandem with commands. Cesar Millan’s techniques are not only unnecessarily harsh, they can serve to condition a dog to expect punishment no matter what it does. This is because Cesar Millan’s techniques operate on the INCREDIBLY misguided principle that we know every facet of canine behaviour and communication, and that the crux of a dog’s existence is dedicated to achieving a dominant role in its “pack”. When you enter into a relationship with a dog with the expectation that the animal’s main goal in life is to supplant you, then you have already gone a good way towards ensuring that your relationship is not going to be a trusting one.
When you start jabbing and alpha rolling a dog, (presumably for things that only you, a human, are capable of considering “bad/dominant behaviour”) the dog ceases to understand what you want from him. This is why rubbing your dog’s face in its urine when you come home from work and find that it dirtied the floor NEVER WORKS. The dog lacks the level of cognition required to connect the act of urination to the uncomfortable punishment. The dog just thinks you’re overly aggressive and the punishment will likely contribute to a reduction in trust. You are teaching the dog to be wary of you by default, because, from the dog’s perspective, you’re the massive aggressive animal that occasionally attacks it for no reason.
It is this lack of understanding of canine cognition and behaviour that makes dogs “act out” in ways that might be interpreted as “deliberate” or “malicious”, but I can assure you that if you look a little closer, you will find that that is never really the case.
At the risk of taking away from this actually pretty important post, dogs can absolutely be vindictive.
My dad had to put his dog in a doggy hotel/kennel for about a week because we went on a trip and couldn’t bring the dog with and had no one else to watch him. So, we get back from the trip, pick up Buddy (the dog), and go home. As soon as we open the door, Buddy bolts down the hall towards the bedrooms.
My dad walks follows him into his bedroom to find the dog shitting on his bed.
It wasn’t like Buddy wandered the house first and just couldn’t hold it long enough for someone to open the back door. No. He headed right for the bed with no hesitation. Any biologist or animal behavior specialist would tell you he knew exactly what he was doing. The fact that my dad claims Buddy made direct eye contact with him doesn’t help dissuade the idea, either.
If that’s not petty vindictiveness, I don’t know what is.
I can assure you that I am both a biologist and an animal behaviourist, and I am telling you that it was not vindictiveness. What you are describing is textbook example of what misinformed dog owners call “revenge defecation”, it stems from nothing more than a misunderstanding of the role feces and urine plays in the social and territorial behaviour of dogs.
It is a symptom of separation anxiety that was no doubt instilled in your dog due to the period in which he was kennelled. People choose to interpret it as “revenge” because people find feces and urine disgusting. Dogs do not share this opinion. For dogs, waste fluids and solids are merely their way of marking territory. When they are stressed enough to feel the need to reassure themselves that they are in fact in their territory, they sometimes forget their toilet training and mark their home in the only way they know how.
Interpreting this behaviour as “vindictive” is potentially extremely damaging to your dog, who is already in a vulnerable and stressed out state. By assuming that your dog did this out of spite you are making several remarkably ridiculous reaches in terms of how intelligent you think your dog is. Dogs do not plan ahead. They do not understand that humans take personal offense to the production of feces. Making eye contact with a human is not inherently a challenge, and could just as easily have been response to your father’s body language (I’m assuming he wasn’t exactly happy to see the dog defecating on the bed).
I mean you’re right in a sense, any animal behaviourist or biologist will tell you that the dog knew what he was doing. The problem here is that neither you nor your father knew what he was doing.
When raising Maple as a puppy I focused more on just the behavior. With Juniper I am trying to focus more on addressing the underlying feeling and it has made all the difference.
I also have a SD FAQ that has more information on SDs! If you don’t see what you need in this list or the other one please message me or send me an ask! I really want to add to this list!
Dogs actually do have a language center in their brains. They process language just the same way we do, just not as well.
Theydo understand our words. This is not true of all domesticated animals (horses, for example, can only manage to distinguish a relatively small number of spoken commands…but boy do they know what you’re really saying).
They don’t understand “just your tone of voice” as a lot of people think.
As of 2016 the record vocabulary for a dog demonstrating understanding of words is over 1,000.
So if you give them a way to talk back, they’re going to use it.
The development of language skills is probably a side effect of domestication and of being kept in close contact with humans. A dog that was a better hunting partner would be kept and bred and over time they developed a better understanding of language.
In other words, dogs are pretty dang smart because we need them to understand us.
And also that is a very good boy.
^ Would like to agree and make one amendment - very good GIRL. This is Stella the dog!
Check out the owner Christina’s Instagram: one of the first things I saw was a video where the dog started barking and, when prompted by the owner, said “outside, look look look look look look look, come outside.” Which is basically exactly how one would expect a dog to speak.
The owner described bringing an unknown package into the house, and the dog ran away to push the buttons for “help no no help help” which is also about what I expect goes on in a scared pup’s mind.
In another video, the dog tried to push a button, and the button wasn’t working. The dog paused and then pushed the buttons for “No. Help.”
In yet another (which the owner seemed impressed by), Stella said “come eat come play.” The owner asked the dog which she wanted to do, to eat or to play? And the dog clarified “come eat.” After eating, then the dog tried to instigate play. So the dog may have been able to understand a short spoken question, and how “questions and answers” work, and also understands sequences, even if she can’t express them (”I want to eat, THEN I want to play”)
Stella can even recount short-term memories, like when her family returned from the beach for dinner and she said “water good, no eat, play”
By the way, the owner uses the buttons as well, which probably really helps reinforce their meaning. She uses them to say things like “Stella all done eat” or “Stella and Christina go outside, bye!”
Wanna know my favorite part? Stella sometimes pushes the buttons for “Stella good” when she’s done a good job. Stella IS good! :D She also makes phrases using “love you,” like “Christina, love you, come play!”
