I often see dog owners making that same mistake. The dog behaves aggressively towards other animals or humans or somethings scares him during his walk. Dog owners try to reassure the dog saying “ there’s no need to be aggressive”, “ it’s okay , this person is our friend” , “ there’s nothing to be afraid of” and so on.
The dog will not only continue behaving aggressively or scared but the behaviour will usually get worse. The reason is simple. Our effort to reassure the dog nothing is wrong, makes the dog feel certain there is something wrong.
Like we have said before, the dog reads our body language and notices the slightest difference in our tone of voice among other things. When trying to reassure the dog , our posture and tone of voice change giving the dog the signal that he is very right to be afraid of this sound, object or person.
Dogs do not need reassurance, they need guidance. There are no grey zones for dogs. Things are either black or white. Which means , the dog needs to know whether the display of aggressive behaviour is acceptable or not. What we need to do is make it clear that this behaviour is not acceptable.
When a dog is afraid of something out on the street, a sound or object, do not try to explain why there’s no need for him to be afraid. Just act normally, keep walking and pay no attention to whatever it is the dog is frightened of. This way, you give the dog the signal that there is nothing wrong, no reason to be afraid or change your course and attitude, and the dog will soon overcome whatever made him nervous or scared.
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