Surviving the Puppy Teenage Phase

If you’ve found yourself wondering why your pup has started to ‘rebel’ or digress with their behaviors, you may be experiencing the puppy teenage phase. Do Dogs Actually Have a Teenage Phase? A group of researchers set out to determine if the teenage, rebellious phase was a real thing or just a term. What they found was that there is a strong connection between certain time periods of a dog’s life, and how they behave. You can read the full study here: https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsbl.2020.0097 Generally speaking, puppies go through the ‘teenage phase’ at about 7-10 months. But keep in mind, that time frame will vary depending on a host of factors including gender, breed, environment, etc. What the researchers found is that when compared to a puppy’s behavior at 5 months, many pups willingly defied cues from their pup parent at around 8 months old. Additionally, many self-surveyed pup parents reported an increase of rebellious behavior from their pups around that same time period. So, yes… the puppy teenage phase is real. Can You Avoid the Teenage Phase While there are some things you can do to make the rebellious phase less rebellious, this phase is often out of your control. Your dog’s hormones, chemicals, brain activities, etc. are often playing a role in this teenage phase and that is completely out of your control. How to Survive the Teenage Phase While there isn’t one silver-bullet answer to surviving this phase, there are some things you can do to help make the time more successful. 1. Decrease freedom 2. Increase training  3. Try new things #1 - Decrease Freedom Often right as our pups are starting to get better at certain behaviors, we start to give more freedom. That can be freedom in the home, freedom off-leash, freedom with choices, and other things. Unfortunately, when you combine a rebellious teenage phase with newly added freedoms, you create a recipe for disaster! While it can be enticing to want to give your pup more freedom, I recommended sticking to what you know has worked for the first months of your pup’s life. That means sticking to crating your dog while you aren’t home, not letting them off-leash, and generally keeping boundaries for your pup. #2 - Increase Training Similar to decreased freedom, often a helpful solution for the puppy teenage phase is to increase your training routine. Again, we often start getting complacent with our pup’s behavior right about the time they’re going to hit the teenage phase. We start to think they’re performing well, and we get lazier with our training. That is totally normal, but should be avoided if possible! The 7-10 month age range is the perfect time to buckle down on training and really commit to consistency. If you can keep up with training consistently for the entire first year of your dog’s life you will be so happy you did! #3 - Try New Things The first 6 months of my dog Scout’s life, she couldn’t care less about fetch.  We tried everything to get her interested, but it didn’t stick. And then right when she hit about 7 or so months, a switch flipped. She fell in LOVE fetch! Just because something worked (or didn’t work) at the beginning of your puppy’s life, doesn’t mean it will always be that way. So if you find your pup going through a particularly rebellious phase, try out some new things. Introduce new training techniques, play new games, try new toys, test out new treats, etc.! Dogs change, and we should try to lean into that change as much as possible!