I also am influenced by my friendship and observations with our police K9 trainer who works once a month with all the dogs and handlers to reinforce the commands they have learned. He says if the dogs sense weakness or sloppiness from a handler, the dogs (Belgian Malinois) are eager to step in and take over. So the training is as much for the handlers as for the dogs.

I don’t think Poodles or mutts are this eager to be in charge, but I do think on-going training is important.

I will always inwardly cringe when I hear someone use the terms you described but I will work on not always assuming the worst as well.

When I cleaned their puppy pen, I placed them all in a crate, large enough for a full grown medium sized dog. At three weeks old, the rest of the pups were peaceful, chewing on toys or each other, or taking a nap. She climbed to the top of the crate, screaming non-stop. She strained so hard that she partially herniated her rectum. (Treating that is a whole nother story, but it repaired its self as she matured and the muscles tightened up.) I had to pad the crate heavily because she would hang on at the top of the crate, bumping her nose on the top bars, until she was exhausted and fell to the floor of the crate. After a few moments rest, still screaming, she would again climb to the top and repeat that over and over for about 20 minutes until she finally was totally exhausted and would go to sleep.

Before she was 3 weeks old, when playing with the other pups, if another pup got rough she would go into “killer mode”, growling, snarling, biting so viciously I would have to forcibly detach her from the other pup. She guarded the food, toys, and bedding like a male lion in a pride.

Many times a day I picked her up, put her belly up in my arms and forcibly held her, my hand on her chest, until she would finally submit. The whole time I talked to her, soft “No.” and then cooed to her, stroked her chest, belly, feet, sides of face and then put her back into the puppy pen. I did that many times a day for months, even after all of the other pups had homes and she was the only one left.

By the time she was 6 months old she was a well behaved, well trained, social, and happy member of my pack (two adult shah tzus). I have never seen her do more than a soft growl to a dog that was really being a pest. Other than rare bouts of stubbornness, I have seen none of the dominant behavior she exhibited until she was about 4 months old.

I dread to think what she could have been if she had been a huge dog, or belonged to someone not willing to spend the time with her, or someone unaware of what she needed.