[Lucy Dog]

Hackles up usually mean either nervous or tense. She "zones out" because she's so tense, she's focusing on whatever is causing her to act this way.

What you want to do is refocus her attention on you. Hows her focus? Does she have a command to focus on you... specifically with her eyes on your eyes?

My advice is to keep socializing. New experiences everyday and always make everything fun. At 6 months, she's probably just going through a fear period. Just keep doing what you're doing with the socializing and when she starts to hackle and zone out, you want to redirect and have her focus on you. When she does that just carry on like nothing happened and of course praise or reward for the refocusing.

 

[Lucy Dog]

Hackles go up at anything exciting. Whether it be a good exciting or a bad exciting, which is why the hackles are often associated with aggressiveness.

Hackles don't always go up with everything exciting. Do you mean hackles go up with everything exciting with your dog or dogs or just in general?

Raised hackles are usually triggered by some kind of stimulation, but they definitely don't always go up with every kind of exciting experience for a dog.