Arousal, Reactivity, and Aggression

Very often, I see dog owners confusing arousal, reactivity, and aggression. Although they are linked to each other, they are all different. Today I'm here to clear out the noise and confusion and explain what each means and how they are related. Let's get into it!

Arousal is a natural biological occurrence that can not be trained out of a dog. These are normal instinctual reactions that are caused by outside sources. An example would be being startled by a sudden loud noise. Something to note, if a dog is forced into a state of high arousal without having the choice to leave the situation, this can lead the dog to growl, snap, and even bite. This doesn't mean this dog is aggressive, this means the dog communicated the only way he knew how during a specific situation.

A great example of this happened to me a few months ago with one of my pet sitting clients. I arrived at the client's home to let their dog's out to use the restroom and when I walked into the house, the dog, I'll call him Fido, immediately started barking at me, but kept his distance. To be fare, this was only the second time Fido and I met and he did really well during our first meeting. As I slowly moved closer to him, he lunged at me and bit my jacket, moved back and continued to bark. I slowly backed away and went back outside to get some treats. After a few rounds of tossing treats in front of him, he was back to his bouncy self and went out to use the rest room. Fido wasn't trying to hurt me, he was scared and protecting his home. If he was actually aggressive, he would have bit with intention causing a puncture wound and wouldn't have backed off when I moved away from him.

Reactivity happens when a dog is in a constant state of high levels of arousal which leads a dog to start exhibiting specific behaviors and responses to a specific stimuli. An example would be a dog barking and/or lunging at another dog while out on a walk. Reactive dog's are also NOT aggressive. They have learned that when they bark and lunge at a trigger, another dog for example, the other dog eventually goes away. To them, the barking and lunging are working great to keep other dogs away.

Aggression typically occurs when a dog lacks boundaries, socialization, and training. Which causes a dog to intentionally behave hostile to other dogs and or people. A few examples are bullying, multiple biting incidents, and learned aggression, such as resource guarding. Another example of learned aggression is when a dog tries to communicate, but has learned that biting is the only way to communicate effectively.

I see this type of behavior a lot in videos of kids getting bit. The kid is messing with the dog, and instead of the parent/owner stepping in to stop the kid, they record it. In the video you can see the dog communicating they are uncomfortable by lip licking, adverting their gaze, yawning, and looking away, but the kid won't stop. Once the dog has had enough, they snap at the kid or end up biting them. Now this isn't the kid's or the dog's fault, this is the fault of the parent/owner not knowing how to read their dog's body language and not advocating for the dog and telling the child to stop and explain to them why they should stop. If the dog's communication is ignored enough times, this can lead to them only biting without giving any other signals.

If you're looking to prevent reactivity and aggression, which you should be, it's important to teach your dog how to self regulate and give them activities to burn off energy. I talked about how to do this a few weeks ago in my post "Physical and Mental Exercise". If your dog experiences one bad thing after another, but doesn't have the means or ability to release that energy, their cup is going to overflow. This is when they become overwhelmed and start reacting instead of self regulating. When a dog doesn't learn how to relax and release that energy, it can manifest as so many different behaviors, such as property destruction, separation anxiety, and/or reactivity. For some dogs, not learning how to relax can mean life or death. It's not fair to them nor is it their fault for behaving a certain way. Especially if they were never taught differently.

Whether you have a reactive dog or a new puppy and want to prevent reactivity, check out my Training Programs to see how I can help you and your dog begin your dog training journey. I post a new blog weekly. If you enjoyed reading this post, subscribe below to receive email updates and don't forget to share with your friends and family. Happy Training!