Dogs don’t pet each other on the top of the head, and neither should you.
When a dog doesn’t trust and respect you, they see this gesture as dominance. When you do it to a dominant dog, they see it as dominance and aggression, on your part. That is why they back away or bite you. Those who back away are not fearful, they are just moving away from you trying to disrespectfully entering their personal space. A dog that nips you is telling you to leave them alone and a dog that bites you is telling you to get away from them. How would you feel if a stranger whose presence made you feel uncomfortable tried to pet you on the top of your head? Would you move away from them like Mila does in this video or would you punch them, bite them, like Karma and many of the dogs here used to do. The dogs that nip and bite you are not being aggressive, they are simply defending themselves from humans who are. We see this same behaviour when dogs interact with each other. If a dog is uncomfortable with another dog in its space it will move away. If a dog is very dominant it will nip or bite a dog that inappropriately enters its personal space. If you feel all dogs should just automatically respect every human they meet and allow any person to pet them on the top of the head, you should also be willing to allow any human, including those you are uncomfortable with, to enter YOUR personal space and touch you. No human does, and neither do all dogs, especially dominant dogs.
The vast majority of people, including dog professionals, who get bit every year get bit because they tried to pet a dog that didn’t trust and respect them or entered that dog’s personal space. If you try to pet a dog, if you try to touch a dog’s back or hind end, if you lean over a dog or if you try to hug a dog and its head stiffens, its eyes open wide and become fixated, they stop smelling and especially if they stop panting, they are telling you they do not trust or respect you. DO NOT move any closer or try to touch them. If it is a dominant dog, you WILL get bit and it is NOT the dogs fault, it is yours.
Don’t look at your dog as a baby, but look at them as a 5 year old child. Would you allow strangers to just walk up to you and your child and without your permission let them touch your child? No. So why would you let them do it to your dog? You wouldn’t just go up to someone’s child and try to touch them, so why would you think it’s appropriate to do it to someone’s dog, especially when the dog has bigger and sharper teeth than a child? We don’t isolate or kill children who ‘intentionally’ bite without provocation but we isolate and kill puppies and dogs who bite out of self defense? Human society has to make a paradigm shift from the belief that dogs are inanimate objects without feelings, thoughts, experiences, anxieties and fears to the knowledge that dogs are far more in tune with a person’s energy and true nature than we are and have their own thoughts on who they let enter their personal space, especially dominant dogs. We have to understand that and we, as a species, have to respect that. If you think you have a right to determine who enters your personal space or tries to touch you, then a dog, or any other species, has the same right.
Now with that said, people are still going to try and pet your dog on the top of the head. I even had a client who had someone come up behind her and pick up her dog to give it affection as she was walking it. She was just walking along, minding her own business, when all of a sudden the leash started to go up in the air. She turned to see a woman holding her dog in her arms. So we have to teach our dog that when a person tries to pet them on the top of the head it represents the affectionate lick of their Mother. To do this you start by giving appropriate affection to your dog with your fingertips in the jowls, very slow, soft and gentle, and once your dog’s eyes soften, you move your hand up to pet them on the top of the head. If your dog lowers its head or avoids or moves away like Mila did, you immediately go back to petting with your fingertips in the jowls. You do this multiple times every day until your dog no longer lowers its head or tries to avoid you, like Karma did. You then start having people the dog knows, trusts and respects do the same thing until your dog no longer lowers its head or avoids them. Then you start to get strangers, who you instruct on how to pet your dog property, do the same thing. In time your dog will no longer have issues with people touching their head, unless you have an Alpha dominant dog because they will always have an issue with a human they don’t trust and respect touching them in a dominant manner.
The dogs who you see dragging leashes in my videos are dogs that are learning that the gesture of a human holding their hand out palm up is our way of saying, “Come to me so I can give you affection.” and I use the leash to block the dogs avoidance if they try to move away. Not to force them to let me touch them, but to teach them what my touch means and represents. Eventually I just hold out my hand and they come to me at which point they no longer need to drag a leash. This is how you teach recall, “Come to me so I can give you affection.”
A key factor to the success of teaching your dog this valuable life lesson is that you don’t let the human or other dog go up to your dog, you ‘lead’ your dog calmly to greet the human or other dog. Just like with kids, you have to teach your dog how to properly greet humans and other dogs, evens cats, horses, rabbits or any other creature, in an appropriate and respectful manner.
The first step to understanding the thoughts of a dog is understanding their body language and forms of communication. Simply put, if the dog doesn’t look like it wants you to touch it, it doesn’t want you to touch it. DON’T try to touch the dog until you have been properly trained on how to enter the personal space of a dog that is nervous, anxious, unsure or fearful of you doing so. A treat will never work because a dog that is in a high level state of fight, flight or alert is NOT smelling and is NOT thinking about food. They are only concerned with survival. A soldier doesn’t stop to eat in the middle of a firefight.
Killing dogs that nip and bite people does not change anything, teaching humans to understand why dogs nip and bite people does. If you do not want your children to get bit by a dog, teach them how to properly and respectfully introduce themselves to a dog and teach them to NEVER try to pet a dog on the top of the head, even their own. Always pet with your fingertips in the dog’s jowls first.
If you have a dominant dog that has nipped or bitten other dogs or people, I hope this helps you understand why and helps you learn how to teach your dog not to do so in the future. My pack and I can help you both get there.
Cheers 
