Maggie used to make noises to get attention.
Daddy will whine pitifully if another dog has a toy ... even though he is surrounded by other toys.
Linus will just bark non-stop at anybody or anything if he wants attention.
Bella-Bear does chewbacca noises to get what she wants.
....... and I wouldn't change it for the world!!!
Sancho used to do this when he wanted attention. We ended up teaching him the "quiet" trick, because he learned that anytime he whined we'd just respond and it got to the point that we couldn't do anything else, like cleaning the toilet or mowing the grass, unless he was Right. Up. In. It.
He still lets us know he wants to play -- barks or runs up with a toy, but now he knows he won't get anything unless and until he's quiet. It took a few days of ignoring him (definitely hurt us more than him, I think), but he learned. Now, he pretty much only whines, whimpers or makes those funny Wookie/bully sounds when he's really tired but doesn't want to go to sleep, LOL
He's so much like a little kid, it really is amazing!
Heh, it's hard to say! In this particular case, I think he was scared of the box and what may or may not pop out of it. You can tell he was soooo excited, but he was nervous, too. Poor guy. If we'd let him inspect it for a few minutes before showing him what was inside he probably would've gotten a bit more vocal. In general, he's afraid of most boxes, though -- maybe he had a bad experience w/ a jack-in-the-box or something?!
In other circumstances not involving boxes, though, it's consistent training.
When he begins the barking/whining to get our attention, we say "Quiet" once and wait til he is quiet for about 30 seconds. Then we praise him, pet him, give him a treat and say, "Good quiet!" For the first couple of weeks or so we did this every single time. Now, it's more of a habit, so we don't always have to reinforce with anything more than a "Good quiet!" but he still gets petting (and treats if we happen to have them on hand) every now and then.
The other side of the coin is "Speak." He can't be quiet all the time! So, when he starts his whining and barking, we do the "Quiet" routine, but then we also play with him and tell him "Speak!" Then he barks and gets excited and we play and stuff.
In this way, he still gets what he wants--our attention--most of the time, but he understands "Quiet" when we are out or have guests or whatnot.
Anyway, I didn't intend for this to be a dissertation, but it just kind of ended up that way. Basically, all that to say -- CONSISTENCY!
Hope this helps
