21/10/2025
Why you can’t train genetically-inclined traits out of a dog.
Dog have been selectively bred for hundreds of years to best aid us in work, protection and to offer us companionship. Over time, each breed has adapted genetic inclinations to best suit their role, with selective breeding resulting in only the best suiting dogs being bred to represent their breed and role.
Due to this, we see dogs raised exactly the same show significant differences in behaviour, due to their varying genetic dispositions.
Recent research from the National Institutes of Health shows that in variants of a large‐scale study of 101 breeds, genes contributed 60-70% of the variation in traits such as trainability, aggression toward strangers and prey drive.
Another genome mapping effort found strong breed to breed variations in brain regions known mediate fear/aggression.
So what does this mean?
Different dogs and different breeds are going to have different default reactions, motivators and trainability, and all of this must be fully appreciated and taken into account whilst training.
For example, a sheepdog is bred to be highly tuned to certain motor‐patterns and focus tasks. training can channel those behaviours, but cannot remove the innate drive at root to herd.
Whilst you can theoretically shut a dog down enough that it does not show wants and needs, the lack of appropriate outlets for drive is setting dogs up for increased frustration and therefore negative fall out behaviours. Instead, learn to fufil your dog in ways that are more productive. Enter the world of dog sports or find ways to fufil your dog in your own time in a way that works for you.
Better to provide enrichment than to let them find their own, which is likely to be problematic for humans!
What are your thoughts? Do you agree?
