Yes, They Get Depressed, Too!

Yes, They Get Depressed 1, Too!

People often say that pets and their owners grow to look like each other. Recent research from Brisbane claims that pets also have emotions like their owners and even the same psychological problems.

Professor Judith Blackshaw is an animal 1)behaviourist on a quest to solve human misery 2. Along with her psychiatrist 3 colleague, Professor Ivor Jones, she’s looking for the root causes of depression and anxiety. Miss Izzy, the 2)Staffordshire terrier, isn’t just along for the walk; the professors believe 3)domestic animal behaviour is the key.

Blackshaw: Well I think the big thing we are trying to achieve is to show people that the 4)species of animals are very similar. A depressed person and, of course there is a lot of depression in the world, and a depressed animal are very similar. For example, I had a cat who died from depression. Now we might call it grief or broken heart, but this cat’s companion was actually killed by a dog.

The cat was so 5)traumatized it refused to eat; the owners not picking up the signs in time for Judith Blackshaw to treat it. To Professor Jones the situation sounds all too human.

Jones: There are many conditions where there are close similarities between psychiatric states and animal states.

It’s not a view though shared by mainstream 4 psychiatry 5 where animal behaviour is not considered relevant to human depression. But to professors Blackshaw and Jones the 6)parallels between humans and animals are so powerful, they can only be explained by a common source.

Jones: Well, psychiatry has found all sorts of ways of understanding all these psychiatric 7)syndromes: depression, anxiety, 8)obsession 7 and so on. But they haven’t described how it evolved, and I think that’s what we’re trying to do.

Blackshaw: This is the exciting thing there’s never been a study that I know of that’s compared human and animal cases.

There’s more to this study, though, than simply two academics in passionate 8 pursuit of pure knowledge. According to public health authorities, 800,000 Australians suffer some form of depression each year. Treating depression costs half a billion dollars a year and that’s not including the cost of anxiety illnesses. Dollars and cents though don’t measure the human cost.

Two-legged animals aren’t the only beneficiaries of the professors’ work. Already a few 9)vets have 10)twigged to the parallels between people and their pets. When the family 11)pooch or 12)moggie gets depressed, they’re prescribing 13)Prozac and other human psychiatric drugs.

For Judith Blackshaw and Ivor Jones, the success of human drugs on animals is just one further piece of evidence for how close the species are.

Blackshaw: Cats, dogs and humans are emotionally very, very similar. After all we’re all domesticated 11 animals.

注释：
1) behaviorist [bi5heivjErist]  n. 行为学者，行为科学家
2) Staffordshire terrier 斯塔福德狗
3) domestic [dE5mestik] a. 驯服的
4) species [5spi:Fiz] n. 物种
5) traumatize [5trC:mEtaiz] v. 使受损伤，使受精神上创伤
6) parallel [5pArElel] n. 类似，相似物
7) syndrome 6 [5sindrEum] n. 病症
8) obsession [Eb5seFEn] n. 强迫症
9) vet 9 [vet] n. 兽医 
10) twig 10 [twi^] v. 注意，了解
11) pooch [pu:tF] n. <美俚>狗，杂种狗
12) moggie [5mC^i] n. <英俚>猫，也作moggy
13) Prozac百忧解，一种抗抑郁药物，通过提高大脑中复合胺（患有抑郁症的病人被检测出大脑中这种物质的含量很低）的含量达到振奋精神的作用。

宠物也忧伤
   
人们常说宠物与它们的主人会渐渐地变得越来越相似。最近一份来自布里斯班的研究结果表明，宠物不仅和它们的主人一样有情绪，甚至还存在相同的心理上的问题。
朱迪斯·布莱克肖教授是一位动物行为学家，正从事一项关于人类悲苦情绪的分析与研究工作。她与她的同事——精神病学家艾弗·琼斯教授一道，探求抑郁和焦虑的根源。这条名叫伊子小姐的斯塔福德犬对研究起到了重要作用。两位教授认为家畜的行为举止正是揭开谜团的关键。

布莱克肖: 我认为，我们现在所做的是为了达到这样一个重要目的: 让人们知道不同物种之间是非常相似的。一个抑郁的人——世界上抑郁的人毫无疑问有很多——和一只抑郁的动物非常相似。比方说，我见到过一只猫就是抑郁而死的，或者我们也可以说是悲痛或伤心而死，而这只猫的伴侣的确是被狗咬死的。

这只猫精神上受到了极大的打击以至于拒绝进食。由于猫主人未能及时地注意到种种迹象，所以朱迪斯·布莱克肖错过了治疗时机。对琼斯教授来说，这种情形听起来实在与人类太像了。

琼斯: 在很多情形下，人的精神状态与动物的精神状态有着极为相近之处。

不过，主流精神病学与此意见相左，他们认为动物的行为举止与人类的抑郁没有关联。但对布莱克肖教授和琼斯教授来说，人类与动物的相似之处如此有说服力，唯有用相同的根源才能加以解释。

琼斯: 对于所有这些诸如抑郁症、焦虑症和强迫症等精神病症，精神病学上已经采用了各种各样的方法进行解读。但他们并没有对病症的成因加以阐述。我认为这正是我们的目标。

布莱克肖: 令人兴奋之处在于，据我所知，从未有过科学研究将人类与动物的病例相提并论。

两名学者对纯学术的追求满腔热情，但这项研究的意义并不仅限于此。公共卫生当局的调查数据显示，每年都有八十万澳大利亚人遭受不同形式的抑郁症的困挠，每年此项治疗费用就高达五亿澳元，这还不包括焦虑症的治疗费用。而人们因精神上的问题而忍受的痛苦却是无法用金钱来计算的。
人类并非两位教授研究的惟一受益者。有一些兽医已经留意到了人和宠物之间的相似性。当家养的猫狗精神不振时，他们会开出百忧解以及其它供人类服用的精神病药物。
朱迪斯·布莱克肖和艾弗·琼斯认为，人类药物在动物身上应用成功进一步证实了这两个物种的相似性。

布莱克肖: 猫、狗和人类在情感方面具有极强的相似性。归根结底，我们都是驯化动物嘛。