Unfixed Female Bulldog!

Question
Hey I just got a 4 yr old English Bulldog, she's is such a cuddlebug. Thinking she's a lapdog. My one question is that everyonce in a while she will have her back legs on my left side laying across my lap, licking my right arm like crazy, and will start to make the humping motion. She will only do it to myself, and there are lots of guys living here. It's proballly dominance, how should I be reacting?
I try to aggressively say 'No' but she gets so embarrassed, she can't look at me for quite a while, but does stop. Am I reacting correctly?

Answer
Hi, Jennifer,

Thanks for the question.

It's definitely not dominance. In fact there's essentially no such thing as dominance or submission. That's an antiquated idea that dates back to a Nazi biologist named Konrad Lorenz.

Here's a link that explains this more fully: http://tinyurl.com/2q2esp

Generally speaking, humping is an indicator that a dog has the urge to release his or her internal emotional energy but feels constrained or restricted about doing so. You see it mose often in how dogs play together. If one dog has a strong feeling of social attraction toward a particular dog, and that dog doesn't reciprocate, the first dog will usually do a number of things to try to engage his potential playmate. One of them is humping.

The next time she does I'd recommend that instead of scolding her (which clearly makies her feel bad), I'd give her something to bite, like a bone or a tug toy.

I hope this helps,

LCK