Traumatic Stress Disorder Observed in an Adult Wild Captive Wolf (Canis lupus)
Tenino was an adult female wolf, born in the wild and placed into captivity at 1 year of age because of her participation in livestock depredation. Her method of capture, well documented, involved being darted twice by helicopter and translocated twice. This method of capture would have exposed her...
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| Format: | Text |
| Language: | English |
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| Online Access: | http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.538.9132 http://www.societyandanimalsforum.org/jaaws/full_articles/7.2/mallonee.pdf |
| Summary: | Tenino was an adult female wolf, born in the wild and placed into captivity at 1 year of age because of her participation in livestock depredation. Her method of capture, well documented, involved being darted twice by helicopter and translocated twice. This method of capture would have exposed her to the 2 factors that are important in the eti-ology of posttraumatic stress disorder in humans: uncontrollability and unpredictabil-ity. In a case study we conducted, Tenino displayed symptoms that were similar to those of humans with posttraumatic stress disorder. These symptoms included hypervigilance, exaggerated startles, generalized fear, avoidance, and arousal. She also displayed looking up behaviors that occured during the presence of perceived threats such as a neighboring rancher’s gunshots; the keeper truck; some keeper activ-ity; and, occasionally, aircraft. When compared to 3 other wolves, including her en-closure mate, these behaviors were exclusive to Tenino. Animals other than humans, subjected to various experimental psychological trauma, often produce behavioral disturbances that resemble human posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms (Kolb, 1987; van der Kolk, 1987; van der Kolk, Greenberg, Boyd, & Krystal, 1985). This suggests that common etiological factors may be involved in the development of PTSD in ani- |
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