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Key points
- By choosing a dog trainer with an authoritative parenting style, you can improve outcomes for your pet.
- Less can be more with training; relax and become your dog's emotional anchor.
- Kids and dogs gain confidence when allowed to make appropriate choices.
Professional dog trainers rarely talk about the four parenting styles: neglectful, permissive, authoritarian, and authoritative.
Yet, each of these styles reflects very different methods, and those methods are linked to very different outcomes.
If you can spot your dog trainer’s parenting style, you will better understand the long-term impact they could have on your dog’s well-being.
Dog training vs. pet parenting
Previously I detailed how the four parenting styles have a similar effect on children and dogs.
If you’re new to parenting styles, be aware that two styles have similar-sounding names but very different approaches: authoritarian and authoritative. Authoritarian style relies on harsh punishment and demands; authoritative style relies on positive reinforcement and building cooperative relationships.
Most parents use the style in which they were raised. They may even alternate between styles. For example, a parent could be permissive in certain situations and authoritarian and punitive in other situations.
Professional dog trainers are sometimes inconsistent in their style choice, too. For example, a self-described “balanced trainer” may use opposing methods, such as positive reinforcement food rewards (which align with authoritative style) and punitive electronic shock equipment (which aligns with authoritarian).
It can take a little detective work to determine if a specific trainer or dog behavior professional is consistently aligned with authoritative parenting. But it's worth the effort for your dog's wellbeing.
Seeking optimum outcomes: authoritative pet parenting
How can you identify a dog behavior professional whose methods consistently align with optimal, authoritative parenting?
Start by looking for trainers who use labels such as “progressive,” “dog-centered,” “relationship-based,” “evidence-based,” and “positive” training.
Veteran progressive and positive trainer Victoria Stilwell, founder of the Victoria Stilwell Dog Training Academy and my colleague at positively.com, uses methods that align with authoritative parenting. I sat down with her to discuss the parallels between parenting and dog training.
“Everything that I do with dogs is based in understanding their needs and trying to fulfill those needs,” she says. “And that's the same with my daughter; everything was trying to understand her needs and trying to fulfill those needs.”
Whether with a dog or a child, Stilwell works to instill confidence, emotional resilience, and a feeling of safety—guiding each without causing physical or emotional harm, even when she needs to be very firm.
“There's no such thing as a purely positive trainer,” explains Stilwell. “It's just that we have varying levels of punishment that are the least intrusive and the least aversive and the least traumatic.” What might that look like? It could involve removing a dog’s desired food or removing the animal itself from a situation where it can't cope, she says.
Defusing fear, building trust
“Emotional stability in dogs is extremely important for safety. You’re not going to have that if that dog doesn’t feel safe or confident or trust you—and neither are you going to have that in the child,” Stilwell explains.
When a child is fearful, Stilwell says, you “put your arm around that child and go, Hey, it's OK.” As the child's advocate, the parent does not force the child into a position where they’re uncomfortable. A sensitive parent does, over time, find safe and more comfortable ways to introduce the child to new challenges. “You do the same with dogs,” says Stilwell.
At one time, trainers believed that if dogs were fearful, then it was best to “ignore it because you don't want to reinforce that fear. Well, we now know that's BS,” she says. Instead, just as for the child, you communicate, “Hey, it's OK. I'm here. I’ll serve as your emotional anchor.”
Being an emotional anchor might mean literally holding the animal if that dog is comfortable being close to you. But being an emotional anchor can mean just remaining nearby and providing a calm, centered, and supportive presence.
Relaxing and being their emotional anchor
“I have this phrase, which is ‘just be.’ It means you take all the minutia out of it,” says Stilwell. Often, that means putting aside training or teaching standard obedience tasks and simply going for a lighter touch. “When you're relaxed, it's almost like you ‘just be,’” says Stilwell. “You do less.”
She compares this philosophy to how experienced actors don’t strain or try too hard to dominate the stage, but instead let their presence speak volumes. “Dogs can feel it,” she says. “Your truth comes out when you do less. You ‘just be’ and they could feel it.”
Stilwell gives the example of a massive 4-month-old bulldog puppy she worked with. Despite its huge size, this puppy was quite scared and worried about being outside. Instead of insisting that it go for a walk on a leash, she brought the animal to a little grassy area just beyond the house. Then they sat together.
Her presence conveyed “We'll watch people go by and we'll watch cars go by, and we’ll just do less and ‘just be.’” Stilwell provided an emotional anchor, helping the pup build confidence and social connection, simply by allowing the animal to opt out of a walk that terrified it and at the same time providing a comfortable and enriching alternative.
Empowering with choices
Even when a child is 3 or 4 years old, the parent can ask, “Do you want to wear this or do you want to wear that?” In this way, the child gets an age-appropriate sense of autonomy, Stilwell believes. “Studies have shown that you give a sense of autonomy to children, and they grew up to be more confident adults,” she says.
She also makes a point of offering choices to dogs, such as “Which toy do you want to play with today?” or “Which direction do you want to go on this walk?” (limiting their choices to safe directions, of course).
“I truly feel like because everything is directed by us for these dogs, and they are so dependent upon us, that it's very disempowering at times. If you can empower with even just a sense of autonomy at certain points, I think it improves connection. I think it improves confidence,” she says. “Choice empowers dogs and empowers kids as well.”
