Curing Your Dog of a Fear of Children

Children of all ages can be loud, and young children in particular can be uncontrollably noisy and screechy. For a pup this can be quite daunting and it is not uncommon for pets to develop a fear of children. It often arises due to a bad experience of being roughly played with by a noisy child, but some dogs just inherently don’t like the sounds made by children and babies, particularly when an infant arrives into a previously quite home. A fear of one child can quickly generalise into a fear of all children, so it is important to try to tackle any anxiety as soon as you notice it.

If your child is old enough to understand what is going on and able to try to help, encourage them to sit quietly and offer treats (preferably balanced ones bought from a quality pet food retailer) and toys to your dog when it approaches so that your pet learns to associate children with rewards and positive things rather than loud noises. Keep these little training sessions short and regular and your pet will soon become more relaxed around young ones.

If you have a young baby whose shrieks and crying you cannot control, another option is to have CD or tape recording of baby noises – some more grating than others – and play them to your pet whilst you give it attention and rewards to weaken the association between loud noise and fear.

Desensitising animals to screams as soon as they start reacting to them is one of the best ways of curing or even preventing the development of anxiety and fear.