What Is Impulse Control In Dog Training?

Take a moment and think about some of the most frequent undesirable behaviors that our dogs exhibit. For example, the dog who bolts out the door as soon as it opens. Or the dog who charges towards a small animal in the backyard. Or the dog who swipes food off the counter.

What do all of these situations have in common? Well, aside from each being very frustrating for dog owners, they also demonstrate a dog’s lack of impulse control.

Impulse control isn’t about obedience or commands. It is about building a foundational skill that you and your dog can utilize in everyday life situations. Impulse control is difficult for your dog because it goes against many of their natural instincts, but implemented successfully, it helps to build immense confidence and trust in your dog’s behavior.

What is impulse control?

Put simply, impulse control is the ability to pause and think before acting.

As humans, we learn from a young age not to rely entirely on impulsivity in our day-to-day lives. Parents teach their children that, even though something may seem incredibly desirable at first thought, it may not necessarily be better in the long run. A good example of this is a young child who wants a cookie and, rather than asking, takes one cookie (or two, or three…) from the jar and consumes them. The child is acting on impulse rather than considering rationality, not understanding the consequences of a) disobeying their parent and b) the potential health impact. For humans, the concept even extends into adolescence and adulthood, and can be affected by emotions and hormones (ex: the ‘impulsive shopper’ or the ‘comfort eater’).

Impulsive behaviors are often driven by instinct as opposed to rationality. They play into the motivators that are right at our core, and we have to work on curbing them unless we want our impulses to dictate our lives and decisions. Impulse control isn’t something we are born with – and this is the same for dogs. Implementing impulse control with our dogs is something that can improve their safety and integrate them seamlessly into our lives; despite these benefits, impulse control is one of the most difficult things to teach your dog.

Why dogs struggle with impulse control

Dogs have a difficult time with impulse control because it goes against many of the instincts they needed to survive in the pre-domestication era. It was completely natural for dogs to bark, chase, eat, grab, and any other number of behaviors that you can think of – because if they did not do those things, their actual survival was at risk.

Even as people integrated dogs into everyday life, the dog’s innate behaviors were often harnessed for human benefit. Consider the herding breeds who were used to move livestock around a farm, or the Retrievers who accompanied hunters because they were so adept at retrieving objects. In these examples, people actually used the dog’s natural tendencies to their advantage.

All of which brings us up to the modern-day. The typical pet dog owner does not necessarily want their dog to bark, chase, eat, grab, herd or retrieve in every situation. This is out of pure human convenience – perhaps because we want to preserve harmony in our household, or we want to keep everyone safe, or we want to reduce noise, or many other reasons. Impulse control is very difficult for our dogs to master because it is going against thousands of years of history.

Why impulse control matters

Although teaching impulse control to dogs is not an easy feat, it has several tangible benefits in the real-world:

Safety. Impulse control can prevent your dog running straight towards a dangerous situation, like a busy road or a wild animal.
Improved household behavior. Impulse control reduces the likelihood of behaviors like counter surfing, lunging and barking.
Improved focus. Impulse control teaches your dog to look to their handler or owner for guidance.
Calmer social interactions. Impulse control encourages your dog to be calmer in new situations, or around unfamiliar people.

How to teach impulse control to your dog

The difficulty of teaching impulse control to a dog will depend on a variety of factors, such as the breed characteristics, lineage of the dog, the household environment, and any learned behaviors that may hamper successful learning outcomes. Working with a professional dog trainer to systematically improve impulse control may be beneficial.

If you intend to work with your dog yourself, start slowly and build up to more complex training activities. Here are some ideas for very simple exercises to begin teaching impulse control;

Put your dog in a Sit, and wait calmly in front of a closed door before allowing them to proceed through it.
Scatter treats in front of your dog, and teach them to wait for your command before eating them
When feeding your dog at mealtimes, have them wait in a Down before they are released
If your dog is holding a toy, teach a release cue (“drop it”).

You can use a clicker throughout these training activities to ensure your expectations for your dog are consistent for them. In fact, consistency with reinforcement is probably one of the key factors when it comes to building and teaching impulse control in your dog.

Once your dog has mastered the easier exercises, you can then teach impulse control in different environments, with a variety of distractions and longer durations. When doing this, it is imperative that you don’t ‘run before you can walk’ – your dog will be challenged by exercising impulse control in a busy park, around new people or dogs, or for longer periods of time. Again, begin gradually and work up to more difficult training scenarios.

Finally, for owners with ‘hyperactive’ or energetic dogs, teaching impulse control might seem like an impossibility. There is no doubt that it can be more challenging when working with a high-energy dog as opposed to a more docile breed. However, you will be surprised how impulse control (combined with introducing other elements into your dog’s life, like a reliable routine and structure) will help to bring control and predictability to your dog’s behavior. In turn, this improvement will lead to you providing your dog with more freedom – because you can trust them to listen to you.

In conclusion

Impulse control can be a true game changer for your relationship with your dog. It teaches your dog clear expectations in a variety of scenarios, and helps them to look to you for guidance as opposed to acted purely on instinct. This can be extremely beneficial when faced with situations that are merely frustrating (ex: countersurfing) up to those that can be actually life-threatening (ex: running towards a busy road).

Need help teaching impulse control to your dog? Our team of professional dog trainers can help! Highland Canine Training has trainers located across the United States. Contact us today or find your nearest dog trainer here.