“I would never take a dog and lock them up inside a cement kennel for 9 or 10 hours with poor food and only a laptop for company, but that’s what we do to ourselves all the time,” says author Laurel Braitman. “Then we wonder why we are suffering.”
Her book, Animal Madness: Inside Their Minds, explains how understanding an animal’s mental health is not only a fascinating insight and ethically sound, but can also help us to understand human mental health better.
“Most of the things that help us, help them, and most of the things that help them, help us,” Braitman says. “All the things you can do to make your dog less compulsive and less depressed are all the things you can to make yourself less compulsive and less depressed.”
And yet, animal psychiatry tends to think of their behavior as a product of their environment, whereas human psychiatry tends to think of our behavior as a function of our chemistry and our background.
“I think we should think of ourselves more like the animals we are, and treat ourselves accordingly,” Braitman suggests.
Animals had the drugs first
Many animals now receive mental health treatments, especially in the United States. The concept may seem odd to some, but the crossover between human and animal mental health is closer than we think.
“Most of what we know about treating mental illness stems from the last 150 years of studies on animals,” Braitman says. “People think it’s weird that dogs are taking Prozac and zoo gorillas are taking Xanax – that they’re taking human drugs. But the truth is that these are animal drugs.”
The drugs were originally tested on animals, and were shown not only to be non-toxic, but also to help them relax. “It’s not that much of a leap to give back to them the drugs that they gave us in the first place,” Braitman adds.
This is not to say that drugs are necessarily the best option—for animals or humans.
“There are psychopharmaceutical drugs available, but I think they should be the last resort,” Braitman says. “Much more important for social animals is time with other animals – and that could be their own species or other species. Exercise has also been shown to be at least as helpful as anti-depressants.”
So how easy is to diagnose an animal?
According to Braitman, animals can’t be diagnosed at first sight. You can’t walk up to a group of gorillas in the wild and say “that one’s depressed.” But at the same time, the lack of verbal communication doesn’t have to be a hindrance. Just the same as diagnosing children, observing behavior over a period of time can provide a pretty clear sign.
A major crossover between human and animal problems is a lack of purpose. With captive animals, taking away the things they would normally spend their time on, such as searching for food or building a nest, can lead to compulsive rather than productive behavior. Even with pets, we need to keep their minds stimulated to keep them healthy.
“And it’s the same with humans,” Braitman says. “Everyone needs a job. We all want to feel useful and busy.”
She adds that: “We have all the power in the world to make our pets happy, mostly by doing the things that make us happy. I guarantee if you run around on the beach with a stick you’re gonna have a good time.”
Not all the examples are so common – going to the zoo one day and playing harmonica for a gorilla would brighten its day, Braitman says. She recently explained to TED some ways in which we could be a “better human at the zoo” (even if we don’t like zoos). Along with harmonica playing was the idea of wearing a costume.
Sounds more fun than 10 hours on a laptop, for sure.
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Feature Image: Thinkstock
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