Supporting calm, confidence, and good habits from the very beginning
What Does “Settling In” Really Mean?
Bringing a puppy home is often seen as the start of training. But before we focus on behaviours, we need to focus on something more important:
How your puppy feels in their new world.
Settling in is about helping your puppy:
- feel safe
- understand their environment
- regulate their emotions
- learn predictable patterns in daily life
When this foundation is in place, learning becomes easier, behaviour becomes clearer, and your puppy is better able to cope with everyday life.
The Foundations: Sleeping and House Training
Sleep and Rest
Puppies require significant amounts of sleep - often between 16–20 hours per day. We often think about how to tire our puppies out so they sleep when we want them to sleep, but it is actually more beneficial to let them sleep whenever they need to. More sleep = more sleep, not less.
Sleep plays an essential role in:
- emotional regulation
- learning and memory
- reducing frustration and over-arousal
When puppies are overtired, we often see:
- increased biting
- difficulty settling
- heightened reactivity
Supporting good sleep includes:
- providing a quiet, consistent sleeping area
- allowing regular daytime naps
- avoiding overstimulation
Whilst we may want them to sleep in a specific location, it is important to remember that in the early days, ensuring they sleep is more important than where they sleep. The “where” can be worked on later.
House Training
House training is best understood as building a consistent habit, rather than correcting mistakes.
Key principles include:
- Taking puppies out frequently (after sleep, food, play)
- Allowing enough time for them to toilet
- Be with them, they will need company outside, whatever the weather
- Reinforcing the correct location
Accidents are a normal part of learning and simply indicate that timing or supervision needs adjusting.
Building the Right Skills Early - Top Tips
Appropriate Habituation and Socialisation
Effective socialisation is not about exposure to as many things as possible. Instead, it is about helping your puppy form neutral or positive associations with the world.
This means:
- keeping experiences low pressure
- allowing observation at a comfortable distance
- avoiding overwhelming situations
Research highlights that early experiences shape long-term behaviour, particularly in relation to fear and anxiety responses (Howell et al., 2015).
The goal is making sure they feel safe and settled no matter what is going on, not to try and get them exposed to as much as possible
Supporting Emotional Regulation
Puppies are still developing the ability to manage their emotional responses. We can support this by:
- reinforcing calm behaviour
- providing structured downtime
- using enrichment that promotes settling (sniffing, licking, chewing)
These activities help activate calmer behavioural states and can reduce arousal (Beerda et al., 1998).
Over time, this builds a puppy who can:
- settle more easily
- recover from excitement
- cope with change
Decompression
Puppies experience a high number of new stimuli in a short period of time. Even positive experiences can be overwhelming. Decompression allows time for:
- processing
- emotional recovery
- returning to baseline
This might look like:
- quiet time after walks
- reduced stimulation after new experiences
- calm, low-demand periods during the day
Early Impulse Control
Impulse control is not about stopping behaviour, but about helping puppies learn to pause and make better choices. These exercises support the development of self-regulation and frustration tolerance over time.
Simple starting points include:
Release cue
Teaching when your puppy is free to move helps provide clarity and reduce frustration.
Teaching a Calm Wait
Your puppy learning to remain calm and settled whilst waiting for their food, a toy or even access to the garden is fundamental in teaching good Impulse control.
On-lead settling
Reinforcing calm behaviour next to you builds the foundation for future real-world skills. Doing this on lead helps your puppy learn when they don't have free access to their environment, life is still good.
Preparing for Everyday Life
Many future challenges can be reduced by early, gentle preparation.
This includes:
- short periods of being alone
- calm handling
- wearing equipment
- quiet time in different environments
These experiences should be:
- gradual
- positive
- and predictable
Supporting Your Puppy’s Environment
Some puppies may find the transition into a new home more challenging than others.
Alongside training and routine, additional support can include:
- Food-based enrichment, which encourages natural behaviours such as sniffing and licking, supporting calmer emotional states
- Omni Dog Calming Diffusers, which may help create a more settled home environment
-
Training and Puppy classes, this will help with that gradual exposure and practicing of key life skills
These approaches are not replacements for training, but can help create conditions where learning and settling are more achievable.
Final Thought
Puppy development is not linear. It is normal to see good days followed by more challenging ones, periods of progress and periods of regression.
This reflects normal developmental processes rather than failure. Continue to focus on:
- consistency
- recovery
- routines
Settling them in is not about getting everything right straight away. It is about building safety, predictability and emotional stability to help them feel prepared for the big wide world ahead of them.
References
Howell, T. et al. (2015). Puppy socialisation and its effects on behaviour.
Beerda, B. et al. (1998). Behavioural and physiological responses to stress in dogs
Appleby, D. et al. (2002). Relationship between socialisation and problem behaviour in dogs
