It’s probably not what you think it is

(This went longer and longer than I expected. At about 12500 words this will be at least a 10 minute read. The images shared on our socials, and here, provide a slimmed down summary.)

While I’ve written a lot about this and adjacent topics a lot, I talk with other guardians about it more and more. Off-leash, out-of-control dogs have become a scourge in public places and while this issue was relevant pre-pandemic, during and since COVID-19, it’s really exploded as a very serious and dangerous trend.

Read more:

No, your dog is not just being “friendly” – the problems with off-leash dogs and applicable ideas for keeping you and your dog safe.

It takes a village – we can be kind and compassionate to other dog-walkers, by helping them out and giving their dog space to maintain comfort

Ya know how you help others out? Put your dog on leash… – if your dog needs to run up and attempt to interact with other dogs, that behaviour is information and those dogs, plus their humans, need guidance

Pandemic Headaches

We are a society still reeling from a generation-defining experience, and likely won’t fully understand the implications for years and perhaps decades.

And the Pandemic led to an increase in the dog population, that hasn’t always been beneficial to dogs. Because dogs were viewed beacons of hope and defenders against loneliness, there were cultural changes in how dogs are viewed and kept.

(Murphy et al, 2022) (Walsh 2023)

Bringing our dogs out and about during those lockdown days, months and years, presented so many difficulties. Lots of on-leash and suburban sniffs, along with everyone else doing the same, meant that dogs’ behaviour was being shaped, much like our own experiences under restrictions. We wrote about those challenges at the time: A Good Walk Spoiled.

While pandemic and lockdown conditions certainly presented lots of challenges to supporting our dogs’ behavioural development and support, many of those challenges were perceived as problematic because of a warped understanding of “socialisation”. (Example here.)

Sun’s out

I notice that each year when the clocks spring forward at the end of March, there is an explosion of off-leash dogs and an increase in incidents involving off-leash dogs. Writing this in the middle of April, I have had two client dogs, and one foster dog, injured by off-leash dogs who ran up to these dogs while they were on lead and engaged with their humans. All of these dogs required veterinary treatment after these interactions and we won’t know yet the behavioural implications.

Regardless of how “doggos” are portrayed on social media, dogs are not benign animals. Normal dogs have complex social lives and they display social stress in multi-dimensional ways. To respect and love dogs, we must recognise that.

It’s not safe for your dog or for other dogs to approach and interact with dogs unfamiliar to them or you.

Other dogs exist. And that’s none of my business.

We play a cruel trick on companion dogs. We ask so much of them, to straddle (at least) two complex social orders, at the same time keeping them in environments suitable for humans, that facilitates human behavioural development and health. Companion dogs often live in social isolation, in under-enriched worlds, and we expect them to like it.

In our attempts to compensate, we provide acute, intense and often inappropriate social and environmental enrichment.

Not only are increased expectations thrust upon dogs, but also guardians. Social media “doggo” culture is not kind to either end of the leash.

Guardians require guidance to understand how to support their dogs, and help them develop appropriate social skills.

The pressure on guardians and their companions to have dogs who love everyone, who are tolerant of all types of social interaction, who can go to all sorts of “dog friendly” (or what we often consider dog-unfriendly) places and events. And that their dogs will enjoy every second.

Let’s reframe and develop a new mantra:

I will support my dog in developing friendships & learning that other dogs exist. I will prioritise supporting my dog through appropriate environmental management to maintain my dog’s comfort in social contexts.”

Our goals are to help our dogs live successfully and comfortably in our human world. That’s no mean feat! Dogs must be able to cope with all sorts of experiences that even humans can find challenging.

What’s more, we have a limited time during which we can safely and effectively prepare dogs for all this human-world nonsense.
We ask dogs to develop social skills to survive and thrive in human and canine social contexts.

What is “socialisation”, anyway?

It’s great that people are aware of dogs’ needs for “socialisation”, but this term, in its popularity, has lost meaning. “Socialisation” has become synonymous with puppies and dogs ‘playing’ with others. And that skewed understanding meant that puppies and dogs during the Pandemic missed out because puppy classes weren’t available. But preparing our dogs for life in the human world requires so much more than class and puppy-play, and indeed might not even need those things at all for success.

Read: Off-Leash Puppy Play…yay or nay?

Learning through play is absolutely valuable for puppies and dogs of all ages but the sorts of behaviours that many people believe to be play should not be our focus and might not be beneficial at all.

But here’s a problem. The use of the term “socialisation” is confused among dog-professionals too so could we expect guardians and non-pros to get it right?

Terminology Tumult

In animal training, as an applied science, terminology is drawn from lots of fields. And to add further confusion, lots of terms are used in every day language differently too.

Terminology Tumult from Dr Susan Friedman.

But we have a problem in our professional and applied field. We don’t have standardised entry routes, educational minimums or well-organised literature from which we can draw consensus on terminology.

“To socialise“, in our everyday uses and understanding, might mean to hang out, to participate in social groups. But “socialisation” in our everyday language, has more specific meanings as a process.

“Socialisation” as a dog-training process

Most of what we understand about socialisation and early rearing needs of puppies stems from classic studies from the 1950/60s, such as Pfaffenberger & Scott, 1959, and Scott & Fuller, 1965.

These works showed us that puppies must have social contact, with other dogs and humans, during their Socialisation Period between 3 weeks and 3 months of age approximately. This period provides a primary socialisation window allowing puppies to form social attachments. If puppies don’t have adequate social exposure in these first months of life, social comfort will be unlikely with later exposure.

During this time, puppies are more likely to interact with novelty (because everything is new!) and their brains are particularly open to learning about how to be a dog and how to interact with humans.

To start with, socialisation happens during these first few months of puppy’s life and is about facilitating the formation of healthy social bonds.

The sorts of experiments designed to identify the limits to developmental periods in puppies required isolation and treatment of puppies and dogs that would not be considered ethical today.

While research has certainly continued looking at this topic, it’s largely been survey and questionnaire based with some validated surveys and independently developed questionnaires. But a common problem in our field is that the literature is relatively small and disjointed; these works have studied early exposure effects in different ways, with different tools, and have described diverse socialisation procedures.

Read more in this review: McEvoy, et al, 2022.

The research we base our understanding of ‘socialisation’ is muddled so it’s no wonder that professionals and pet guardians alike might not always be clear about what it is and how best to do it.

Indeed we don’t really have much valid evidence that confirms most of the procedures we recommend to puppies and their people.

Is “socialisation” for life, and not just for puppies?

In terms of those classic works, socialisation describes a developmental stage early on in puppies’ lives. However, some further works have shown that puppies and dogs must continue to have appropriate social and environmental exposure throughout puppyhood and into adolescence, for example, Serpell & Duffy, 2016.

What is “socialisation” and what does it matter?

Exhaustingly, our field attributes great importance to all sorts of processes and procedures, without a level of valid evidence or clarity to warrant such emphasis.

For sure, puppies and dogs must be reared in enriched environments so that their behavioural development is healthy. Nobody is arguing with that!

The term “socialisation” has come to be applied to providing puppies with social outlets but also with exposure to traffic, substrates and noises. Decidedly non-social stimuli.

Scott, 1957, discusses “localisation” during which puppies appear to form attachments to a particular physical environment, becoming upset, especially when isolated, in novel environments. It is suggested that may be a related process to socialisation.

Perhaps, instead, the importance is on how exposure happens, within appropriate and healthy social contexts. Puppies develop environmental comfort through social comfort, and vice versa. Social environment matters.

Appropriate Social & Environmental Exposure

Because there is so much up in the air about what “socialisation” might mean and how the term is used, I prefer to emphasise the importance of appropriate social and environmental exposure tailored to the puppy’s or dog’s behavioural development as indicated by their behaviour.

Regardless of what we call it, dogs becoming overwhelmed by the presence of other dogs, showing behaviour that indicates they have difficulty recovering from proximity, that’s associated with loss of control, is not in any way akin to preparing dogs for coping with their social world.
Dogs and humans are certainly different but we have lived together for thousands of years, sharing much in terms of social etiquette.

Because we poorly select for behavioural attributes and then keep dogs in under-enriched environments, dogs, particularly young dogs, need support in becoming dogs and being dogs.
This is extra challenging for young dogs who are often highly socially motivated but instead of free-for-alls, they need support to develop appropriate social skills…behaviours that allow them to succeed in relevant social environments.

Bringing our dogs out should provide appropriate enrichment; just enough challenge to maintain interest and learn behaviours that allow them to access reinforcers.