Barking at people saying hello

[Adrienne Farricelli]

Received today the below question from one of our valued members. Below is my reply for others who may share a similar situation with their dogs. This is not an unusual problem with some pups:.

 

"Hello Adrienne,

 

We have rescued a 15 month old German Shepherd for the last 6 weeks. She has settled in with my husband and I really well during this time. We are enjoying your brain training games and she is picking them up really quickly. She is a beautiful dog, she walks well and is really good in the house. She was lurching at dogs and cats but following your advice she hardly pulls at all now when she sees a cat so hopefully in time she will be no problem.

 

The main problem we have with her is when we are out and people want to say hello to her she barks at them. We can stand talking to some one she is fine but as soon as they talk to her she barks at them. We have tried telling people to ignore her and also give her treats when she sees people and doesn’t bark. The main question is what should we do when she does bark at people? We don’t want to make things worse.

 

We hope you can point us in the right direction.

 

Kind regards"

Edited July 3, 2018 by Adrienne Farricelli

[Adrienne Farricelli]

Greetings,

Sounds like you have been doing a great job with your pup, kudos to you! To tackle the barking issue, it would require a multi-faceted approach with the goal of identifying the exact triggers, preventing rehearsal of the problem behavior, exposing to lower levels of intensity and creating positive associations. If she still manages to bark, this should require closer evaluation to what exactly happened and taking measures to prevent it from happening again next time. When the barking takes place, a bit of drama may be removed by saying something like "oops, let's move a bit away, too close for comfort" as you take a few steps back to give relief. Now, let's take a closer look at why this barking likely takes place and what can be done about it.

 

This type of barking often takes place when a dog is not very comfortable being around people she doesn't know. The barking is often evoked when people engage in the "Ohhh, hi pretty puppy!" greeting style versus folks who ignore.

 

Several pups may bark the moment a person looks at them and starts talking to them. In these instances, most likely the puppy has learned to associate the eye contact and talking with the person coming closer and possibly bending down trying to pet the dog because most people do these things in sequence (first look, then baby talk, then come closer).

 

This type of barking can take place in puppies or dogs who haven't been socialized much during their critical windown of socialization roughly taking place between 4 and 16 weeks of age. In some cases, pups were socialized, but they just weren't exposed much to people with certain types of greeting styles.

 

There are also cases where the pups, as they come into social maturity, generally between 12 and 36 months of age, start getting a bit more aloof and reserved and teenager "flakiness" may take place.

 

Tackling this form of barking requires that the dog's emotional response to strangers is changed. The goal is to change the dog's mindset from dreading people talking to them, to wanting people to talk to them as positive associations are formed. Counterconditioning using classical conditioning may work best.

 

Find the Exact Trigger/Triggers

 

What exactly sets your dog off? Is it people talking to your dog in a certain tone of voice? People who talk and move into your dog's space? Men, women, children talking? Acknowledging what sets your dog off is important as it gives you a level of control since you know exactly what triggers the behavior. Sometimes, it's a whole chain of behaviors people do that causes the dog to get increasingly more and more worried until she explodes into a barking frenzy

 

Manage the Environment

Managing the dog's environment is important to so prevent rehearsal of the undesirable behaviors. The more a dog is put in a situation where she feels uneasy, the more the dog practices the barking and soon, it may become a default behavior that will take place more and more in the same or similar circumstance. Practice make perfect. Managing the dog's environment in this case, entails protecting the dog from exposure to scenarios and situations where the barking seems more likely to occur. In other words, you will have to find ways to prevent the triggers from occurring in the first place.

 

Examples of managing the dog's environment may therefore encompass keeping the dog at a certain distance from people, asking people to not approach the dog (owners may say the dog is "in training" and not ready to face certain types of encounters) or asking people to simply ignore the dog. "E.g. "Hello there, can you please ignore my dog as we chit-chat? We are doing some training."

 

Keep the Dog Under Thresold

 

Keeping a dog under threshold means preventing him from reaching the point where things start breaking down and the barking starts. This entails keeping a close eye on the dog's body language for subtle signs indicating that she is getting more and more uncomfortable. Not always these signs are readily recognized as they can be quite subtle. It may be just a quick nervous lip lick, dilation of the pupils or a wrinkling of the forehead as the person makes eye contact, comes closer and shows interest in the dog.

 

Create Positive Associations

 

Now, if we are always protecting the dog from encounters that evoke the barking, how will the dog ever learn not to bark? Great question! The answer is: we do expose the dog to situations where things are better under control and under this setting we work on creating positive associations.

 

The process of counterconditioning entails creating positive associations so to change the dog's emotional response. In this case, with the dog under threshold, it's a good idea to feed high value treats every time the dog encounters people. It is best if the dog owner initially feeds the dog in these cases since the person getting too close to feed a cookie may cause ambivalent approach-avoidance behaviors.

These socialization exercises should be done gradually, starting first with people who ignore the dog and then incrementally increasing criteria by exposing the dog (always at a comfrotable and safe distance) to people who will perform certain triggering behaviors but in a slightly less intimidating form.

 

So for instance, if the barking is triggered by somebody who loudly expresses excitement upon seeing the pup saying "ohhhh what a cute pupppyyyyy!" the person should try saying the same in a lower, less excited tone of voice without looking at the dog while the owner feeds treats, then gradually building up in intensity over several sessions. E.g. the person then looks briefly at dog and talks a bit more excited, then progresses to looking directly and talking more excited, then looks directly, talks excited and bends down a bit and so forth. Very important: when the talking stops, the treat delivery stops.

 

Ideally, to help the dog succeed, these sessions would be done first with volunteer friends who the dog is familiar with, then those who the dog is not familair with. Anybody volunteering to help would have to be instructed on what to do so to have a good level of control of the situation. Even better, having a dog trainer help out is a plus so to provide guidance and a safe and correct implementation of the above described methods.

 

What if the Dog Ends Up Barking?

 

An "oops" moment can always happen and is expected to pop up sometimes in the initial stages of changing the emotional response. In that case, when a dog barks when greeted by people, it may help to move a bit farther back to give the dog relief while recognizing what triggered the barking. This acknowledgment helps to gauge better the distance for next time while making a mental note to self to prevent exposure of the same type and intensity in the future at least until better associations are made.Once at a farther distance, it may help to reward the dog several times for not barking so that the session has at least ended on a "positive note."

 

 

Hope this helps!

Best regards,

Adrienne

 

Disclaimer: behavior modification comes with risks. If your dog is aggressive, please consult with a dog behavior professional for safety and correct implementation. By reading this answer, you automatically accept this disclaimer.