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For all dogs barking is a defense mechanism. As the bigger dogs grow up, there are less things that they find threatening, whereas the small dogs always feels threatened because most things are a lot bigger than they are.

Also, in my anecdotal experience, large dog owners end up putting in more training time because the consequences of not are much greater.

My 50lb, German shepherd looking village dog jumps on grandma? Grandma breaks a hip. My parents 3lb Shit-Poo jumps on Grandma? Cue the cooing.

Similarly with barking. Not saying it's true for all owners, but generally once you start training alot of other behaviours get cleaned up as a side effect.

Napoleon syndrome. Small dogs feel much more threatened and not on control.