Puppy Socialization

Early and positive experiences with novel sights, sounds, and smells is critical to the normal development of puppies. Puppies need to be exposed to a variety of things in the environment while they are forming what is normal and safe in their heads. Many experts say that the critical time for socialization is from 6-12 weeks of age (some extend this to 16 weeks). Depending on where you live and which expert you choose to believe, you might not feel comfortable taking your puppy out and about until his series of puppy shots are complete at 16 weeks.  This means your puppy's socialization could be severely lacking unless you take great efforts to avoid this.

The American Veterinary Society of Animal Behavior has written a position paper regarding puppy socialization.   

..., the American Veterinary Society of Animal Behavior believes that it should be the standard of care for puppies to receive such socialization before they are fully vaccinated.

In fact, behavioral problems are the number one cause of relinquishment to shelters. Behavioral issues, not infectious diseases, are the number one cause of death for dogs under three years of age.

The term socialization can mean different things to different people.  Some people feel their puppy is getting enough socialization by playing with the family's other dogs, maybe the few neighborhood dogs, and a small handful of children the family knows.  They don't consider other factors, such as men with hats and beards, people in crutches, dogs of a different breed or size, loud cars, wobbly surfaces, and on and on.  For some people, socialization is synonymous with exposure.  They feel any exposure is good exposure.  This means the puppy might be put in a "sink or swim" situation.  They bring the puppy to the kid's soccer game and smile as hoards of grabby children jockey to hold and hug the overwhelmed pup.

Socialization should be frequent and it's critical that the puppy has a positive experience with whatever you are exposing him to.  Don't leave it to chance.  Don't assume the puppy will enjoy what is going on.  Strong emotional experiences imprint themselves in our brains.  Instead of letting that scar your puppy for life, use it to your advantage.  When a motorcycle zooms by, don't just stand there, start popping something tasty in your pup's mouth. If you can make the connection that loud fast objects bring hot dogs, your puppy will not grow up to be fearful or reactive to motorcycles but instead will start drooling in happiness the second one speeds by.

To give you an idea of the scope of socialization I am talking about Dr. Ian Dunbar suggests that puppies meet 100 new people by the time they are 3 months old. The same few neighbors over and over again will not do the trick. Seek out people from a wide variety of groups. Don't let those 100 people be white females aged 30-40.

In addition to people, you will want your puppy exposed to a variety of dogs and other animals.  Get him used to walking on different surfaces, eating in different rooms and out of different containers.  Handle him gently all over his body and reward him heavily while doing so.  Thing of all the different things he might experience in his life and give him a positive association with it now.

When you bring a puppy home it can be very helpful to have a checklist of the things you want to socialize your puppy to and post it somewhere easily seen in the house.  This will serve as a daily reminder to not waste those precious weeks where your puppy's experiences can shape his adult behavior.

Here are two documents you can download which list a variety of things to exposure your puppy to:

• My own puppy socialization checklist. 

• The Puppy's Rules of Twelve