14/05/2026
THIS………. Genetics Matter!!!
‼️ 𝐈𝐭’𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐡𝐨𝐰 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐫𝐚𝐢𝐬𝐞𝐝. ‼️
As a dog trainer you’d think I’m shooting myself in the foot by saying this, especially as I do a lot of puppy training and development, and this article is in no way designed to minimise the importance of effective socialisation.
💡 However, it is important to be honest about what socialisation is, and what it isn’t; what socialisation can do, and what it can’t.
Whenever you see a dog attack report on the news, there are inevitably a lot of comments saying “the dog must have been abused” or “it has been raised the wrong way” and similar variations. As dog trainer and behaviourist who works with a lot of very serious aggression cases, to deny that there can often be a genetic component that influenced the dogs behaviour in these situations is at best ignorant and at worst, dangerous.
𝐘𝐨𝐮 𝐜𝐚𝐧’𝐭 𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐬𝐨𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐞 𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐬. Dogs are not all created equal. You can’t train out or change their DNA, the part that makes them who they are.
✅ What socialisation CAN do is optimise the genetics your dog has, you can shape how your dog understands how to access reward, you can give them exposure to different experiences and environments and through training teach them how to effectively deal with stress and pressure. You can increase or decrease their value for different experiences, dogs, people and more, and give them exposure to a range of stimulus during their most critical development periods. Through appropriate socialisation, management and training, we can prevent puppies developing into adult dogs who experiment with and gain success with undesirable or dangerous behaviours.
❎ What socialisation CAN’T do is remove the genetic traits your puppy was born with and make them something they are not.
When a client comes to see me for a puppy raising lesson, a large part of the first session revolves around me assessing the puppy’s drives, temperament and genetics.
The information I gain from this helps me to tailor a puppy raising program specific to that puppy, the owner and their needs and goals. No two puppies ever get the same program. 🐶 🐶
😢 A timid, nervous puppy that runs and hides from new people and dogs is going to need a lot of appropriate exposure to increase those negative values to positive ones, and while we can make huge improvements in these cases, the puppy will always have some level of sensitivity that we need to training to help counter.
A high drive working line puppy can absolutely learn and develop an ‘off switch’ but it is always going to require an appropriate outlet for its drive, or it will find ways to satisfy that drive in ways we often do not enjoy 😬
🚩🚩 A while ago, I had a client bring me a young Malinois puppy. They bought the puppy as a family pet, and wanted a dog that could run around the yard with their small children and their friends. They had a large extended family who would visit regularly. They did not want to do sport or work the dog in any capacity, they just liked how they looked and the ‘idea’ of a having a highly trainable dog.
The pup itself was actually a really nice pup, she had loads of prey and food drive, was confident and intelligent, but as puppies – especially Malinois – tend to do, she was bitey, and would grab a hold of the kids clothes and not let go. She had started alert barking when visitors let themselves in, and would rush towards them with a fixed stare.
One of their children was intellectually disabled and would scream in the puppy’s face, and the puppy had started growling in response.
Even if these owners absolutely NAILED effective socialisation, this was a puppy that was never going to be the right fit for what they needed.
Many Malinois can be friendly with strangers and visitors when young, but naturally become more aloof and territorial as they come into maturity. This is not incorrect for the breed, and it is not something we can avoid or stop by letting them find value in meeting lots of people when they are puppies. Effective socialisation can help them learn to greet people appropriately, maintain life skills around strangers and form relationships with new people, but it can’t stop them from developing territorial behaviour.
🧐 It would be like getting a Border Collie and being surprised when it displays herding behaviour around sheep, or getting a Terrier and being surprised if it chases and kills a rat.
👍 What we CAN do is acknowledge the breed or type of dog we own, identify these traits and learn what that type of dog needs to grow and thrive.
We can teach them what they should be doing by developing reliable life skills so even if they were to exhibit a behaviour that comes naturally to them, like barking if a stranger knocks on the door, obedience can override the instinct to keep barking in that moment.
My Terrier can recall mid chase off a rabbit, and it isn’t because I socialised her around them or tried to minimise her prey drive. I taught her how to harness her prey drive in training and to access prey rewards through obedience with me. I took the genetic components that make her a Jack Russell Terrier and I used them to my advantage, rather than trying to fight or subdue them.
When we do litter assessments at K9 Pro, we often get asked how much we can really tell by looking at a litter of seven week old puppies for around an hour. Steve will often explain we are just seeing a snapshot of those puppies within that window of time, but how a puppy responds to a new experience at that age can tell us a lot about their genetic potential. It is then up to us to learn how to shape and harness it.
➡️ Teaching dog owners how to make their dogs genetics work FOR them rather than against them is one of our specialities, so if this is something you are struggling with or want to learn, reach out – we can help you!
- Bec Chin
Senior Trainer
