The old saw that “rules are made to be broken” may be fine for people on occasion but is a disaster for dogs. Dogs are extremely uncomfortable without consistent rules, even if their behavior might have you thinking otherwise.
Consider a dog who likes to come to the table for scraps of your food. You might feel like giving in sometimes and letting him have a little. But other times you might feel annoyed and tell him in a harsh voice (as he persists, and perhaps drools at your feet while you’re trying to enjoy your repast) that you want him to cut it out. Maybe you even get out of your chair to put some teeth into your admonition. But all that does is make him feel confused, ill at ease, and very insecure about your feelings toward him. After all, he’s only doing what you’ve trained him to do — come to the table because it might end in your dispensing a morsel of your meal.
As much as a dog might want a piece of your dinner, he’d much rather know that he can never have any as opposed to getting some here and there and not knowing when you’re going to be okay with it and when you’re going to get angry. After all, his behavior is consistent; it’s yours that’s veering in two different directions and throwing him off. Dogs feel much more secure when life is predictable. The head of the Tufts Animal Behavior Clinic, Stephanie Borns-Weil, DVM, puts it as follows: “Imagine a classroom of kids with no clear rules and then the kids being punished for going too far without ever knowing what ‘too far’ is.”
The gambling game
Inconsistency turns dogs into gamblers. A dog owner might think his pet is pushing his limits when he expects a scrap from the table every time and should just be glad for “sometimes.” He might think it’s a battle of wills. But your canine pal is not trying to push his limits or wear you down. He’s simply thinking that if it worked once, he can get it to work again, the way someone pulling a lever on a slot machine knows that if he keeps trying, the coins will eventually come out because it has happened before. In other words, it’s an instinct to keep trying because it might work, not an effort to nag you until you give in. And it does not make a dog happy. Do gamblers seem happy when they keep investing more and more money as they continue to pull the lever?
The way to keep a dog from entering into the anxious state of a gambler is not to raise his expectations if you don’t plan to follow through every single time. If you don’t want him to have scraps at the table sometimes, don’t give him table scraps at any time. If you don’t want him on the couch or bed sometimes, don’t let him on ever. And so on.
It might seem cruel, but it’s not. The structure and predictability will make him more compliant and truly happier. He won’t keep having to wonder how the system works, which is too much for a dog to handle. And when you do indulge him in ways you feel good about, you’ll only strengthen the bond between the two of you.
