Why DNA Testing Your Reactive Dog Can Be a Game-Changer
- Ruth Hegarty
- Mar 24
- 3 min read
If you share your life with a reactive dog, you already know the daily dance of reading body language, managing the environment, and advocating for your pup in a world that doesn’t always understand them.
There’s a powerful tool to help you support your reactive dog that many pet parents overlook—dog DNA testing.
Yup! A simple-to-use kit that tells you your dog is part Chihuahua, part Husky, and part Mystery Mutt. It’s fun to discover your dog’s heritage—but there’s another reason you want to DNA test your reactive dog: it gives you a training advantage by helping you better understand your dog’s behavior.
Although “how you raise them”—aka your dog’s life experiences—impacts their behavior, a full 50% of your dog’s behavior is driven by their genetic makeup alone. That’s huge!
1. Clues About Breed-Driven Behavior
Knowing your dog’s breed or breed mix offers insights into why they do what they do. Herding breeds may be hyper-aware of motion and sound, while guarding breeds might be more naturally suspicious of strangers.
Understanding this isn’t about putting your dog in a box—it’s about meeting them where they are. If your dog is part cattle dog and struggles with lunging at joggers, that might make a little more sense. You’re not imagining things. You’re not failing them. You’re just working with a brain that’s wired to behave a certain way.
2. Use DNA Results to Guide Your Training Plan
Once you understand what your dog’s breed—or breed mix—was bred to do (bark, chase, guard, alert, etc.), you can work with those instincts instead of fighting against them.
You might switch up enrichment activities, restructure walks, or change the cues you teach. For example, a dog with high prey drive might benefit from decompression sniff walks or a flirt pole to safely release energy. A natural watchdog may thrive with a structured greeting routine instead of being scolded for barking.
You can’t—and shouldn’t—suppress your dog’s natural behaviors. Instead, provide healthy outlets for instinctive actions while still working on reducing reactivity.
3. Insight Into Health Conditions That Affect Behavior
Illness and pain are often overlooked causes of reactive behavior in dogs. Fortunately, modern dog DNA tests include screenings for health issues that impact behavior, like thyroid conditions, neurological disorders, and pain-related genetic markers.
If your dog’s reactivity seems extreme, unpredictable, or has suddenly worsened, knowing their genetic risk factors can help you advocate for a deeper vet workup.
All the training in the world won’t fix behavior caused by a toothache! Addressing physical health first reduces your dog’s suffering and improves the success of any behavior training.
4. You Might Discover Something Unexpected
As fun as it is to guess your dog’s breed based on appearance, a 2017 University of Florida study found that even experienced shelter workers and vets often guess wrong.
You may think your dog is one thing (I thought Jake was a pit bull mix when I first adopted him) but discover something else entirely. Jake turned out to be a Lab/Boxer/Dalmatian mix with zero pit bull genes!
Discovering your dog’s true breed mix can shift the entire narrative around their behavior. Instead of trying to “fix” your dog, you’re learning about them and how to meet their needs—and that mindset shift is pure gold.
Why I Recommend Embark for Dog DNA Testing
DNA testing isn’t a quick fix, but it’s a powerful piece of the behavior puzzle. It helps you train smarter, advocate better, and connect more deeply with your reactive dog.
My favorite DNA test is Embark. It’s what I’ve used to test both my dogs and what I recommend to all my clients. In fact, I’m such a fan of Embark that I became an affiliate partner with them.
Purchasing a test through the links in this post means I may receive a small commission (at no extra cost to you). I only recommend products I trust and use myself and with clients—Embark is my go-to for accurate, in-depth results, including health screenings and detailed breed breakdowns.
Need Help Making Sense of Your Dog’s DNA Test Results?
Want help honoring your dog’s breed and health insights in a way that supports their reactivity training? Let’s chat! I’d love to help you turn those discoveries into a customized training plan that works for you and your dog.
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