Consequences of behavioural disorders Of Dogs

Consequences of behavioural disorders

 Numerous statistics attest to the life-threatening penalty for any companion animal that presents a behavioural problem to its owner. In this hygiene-conscious age, a dog that eliminates in the home is liable first to receive unremitting punishment, then to be excluded to the outdoors, then finally to be euthanased. Aggression or injury to the owner by the dog is similarly a strong predisposing factor to being euthanased. Estimates of the proportion of young and juvenile dogs euthanased vary between countries, but most studies suggest that more than half of such requests for euthanasia are because they engage in inconvenient or dangerous behaviours (Stead, 1982; Sigler, 1991). 

  Another, obvious consequence of misbehaving is that the dog is rehomed. The perfect lifestyle in a perfect home is not compatible with, say, a labrador that sheds hairs, occasionally defecates, often smells, and chews the furniture when left alone. And yet, any informed observer would find nothing ‘wrong’ with the dog; problems arise because of mistaken human expectations and conflicts of lifestyle. Nowhere on the planet is entirely free from automobiles and cars pose the greatest tangible threat to the freedom and enjoyment of dogs. Because the risk of dogs being killed by cars is so obvious, they must be restrained on leashes and escorted from here to there by humans. Tolerance of being leashed is hardly a trait that featured strongly in the long-term domestication of the dog and it may create a host of frustrations for dogs, at the very least preventing their exchanging normal body signals with other dogs.

  Consequently, dogs that are aggressive or intolerant of other dogs represent over 50% of aggression cases referred to our Animal Behaviour Centre. Training such dogs to recover their normal social skills is a relatively straightforward matter, using equipment such as long lines or extending leashes, headcollars, harnesses and well-timed reinforcement of tolerant signals amongst trained, nonthreatening stooge dogs. To own a dog which is aggressive towards other dogs can produce a dramatic decline in quality of life or enjoyment of the human–animal relationship. Owners become social outcasts whilst walking their dog, often going to deserted spots early in the morning or late at night. The pleasures of meeting and being amongst other dogs and their owners are taken away by having a pet liable to fight. 

  Owners of dogs with unwanted behaviours are often made to feel failures by their contemporaries and guilty that it was somehow ‘their fault’. As we shall see later in this chapter, the underlying causes of behavioural problems are many and varied, and are not necessarily directly attributable to their owner’s behaviour. But, of course, sometimes they are! 
  Finally, there is the matter of legislation, which in most developed countries makes owners liable for dangerous behaviours in their pet. Dogs which are dangerously out of control and might injure somebody can bring prosecutions for criminal behaviour upon their owners in the UK, as in many other countries. Most countries have introduced such legislation, though the boundaries of what constitutes danger or aggressive behaviour is often subjective and dealt with by the courts on a case by case basis. Confusingly, in the USA such legislation is not enacted at a federal level nor even on a state by state basis, rather by local county, city or town ordinances. 

  Some countries have legislation based upon particular breeds, such as dogs above a given height or bodyweight, alternatively of breeds such as American pit bull terriers, which were originally bred for fighting. Such breed-specific legislation usually has no rational statistical basis for enactment and produces real fear and unhappiness when, for instance, a breed such as the Staffordshire bull terrier is confused with the superficially similar pit bull terrier. These matters frequently appear before the courts in all Western countries, where expensive and emotionally charged confrontations are enacted with the possibility of a death sentence. It is a measure of the love and determination of dog owners that so many owners strongly defend their pet in the face of such seemingly dogunfriendly legislation.