Flying Poodles

Useless Ways of Thinking About Dogs

Some number of years ago, a myth about domestic dogs arose: that their behaviors could be explained by comparing dogs to wolves. All sorts of dog-training methods then sprang from this idea, including the idea that humans had to be dominant over their dogs.

Guess what? It’s NOT TRUE.

Researchers finally watched feral dogs to see what kind of social structure THEY have. In the article Dominance in Domestic Dogs–useful construct or bad habit? the authors reached this conclusion:

In contrast to wolves, hierarchical social structures have little relationship with reproductive behavior in feral dog packs. Nor do the exchanges of aggressive and submissive behavior in feral dogs, originally published by S. K. Pal and coworkers, fit the pattern predicted from wolf behavior.

In the body of the article itself (unfortunately not available online), the authors point out that “interactions between dogs and owners appear to fit better into the model where prior experience and context are the major determinants of subsequent response.”

When you translate that out of scientific language, that means you get the behavior you reinforce.