Animal Psyche

I was listening to the interview in Science Friday with the author of new book on Laurel Braitman, the author of ‘Animal Madness’. It is a book about mental states of animals that is strikingly similar to several human conditions. It is not surprising that animals also suffer from many psychological conditions. If we all agree on the fact that several psychological conditions are just like another disease state and many have a genetic origin, then it will not be surprising to know that animals also may share mental illness spectrum similar to humans. During my veterinary practice me too have seen some mentally disturbed animals.

An interesting question is: can we learn more about the mental states and the genetics behind different mental phenotypes (super intelligence is a deviation from normalcy just like psychosis) using our animal friends? With a relatively shorter gestational periods and superior fecundity many of these animals and birds can be good resource to track down the genetic basis of such conditions. Can we develop better imaging and diagnostic tools to identify varying mental states?

This book has gone into the list of my must-reads in this year. Will update once I read it.