Impact of current pandemic on human psychology and its relation to Zoochosis.

We, Homo sapien sapien are the most advanced form of living entities present on earth so far. What makes us so unique and stand out from the rest? The power of memory and imagination that no other living organism possess. We are always after and in search of truth. The truth of the universe, the truth of our existence and truth about everything we observe around us.

But what happened to us, when we were bound to stay in the houses, for our protection from a tiny thing that we can’t even see with our naked eyes? For months?  We started to suffocate inside the concrete walls, it didn’t seem warm or comforting anymore. We started to go insane, depressed, to such extend we needed helpline numbers to cope with it. According to the recent review on psychological impact of quarantine, conducted by Brooks et al. (2020), being forced to stay at home leads to negative psychological effects such as fear, frustration and anger. The increasing cases of suicides and mental illness is evident.

With tremendous means to entertain ourselves being indoors, why we are not able to cope up with this, is a matter to wonder about.

Being social creatures and sharing this planet with wide range of other animals, their beauty, the diversity is overwhelming and we are supposed to be out, wandering, exploring the very essence of nature. We are never meant to be at one place, locked.

The lives of human with that with other animals have always been intertwined. So why the freedom we seek is not same for the animals, who are to be wild, in the wild? We need to rethink of how we are threating our cohabitants in zoos, in captivity that it has driven them to brink of insanity.

Not many have heard of “zoochosis”, a term coined by Bill Travers in the year 1992, when he observed some stereotypical behaviour of animals in captivity with no obvious purpose. Zoochosis can include rocking, swaying, excessively pacing back and forth, circling, twisting of the neck, self-mutilation, excessive grooming, biting, vomiting, consuming excrement and many more. Those behaviours are unusual than what they would normally show in the wild, in their natural habitats.

Why such behaviours? Let me make this simple, have you observed yourself when you’re anxious or stressed out, your legs or hands starts to move impulsively, out of your control? If not, then you must have seen psychotic people in asylums or as portrayed in movies, the person rolling while sitting, mumbling to himself or doing something that is uncommon in a mentally healthy normal being.

This is exactly what happens to those animals kept in captivity, in zoos, inside concrete cells, in spaces so small compared to what they have in the wild. They are left with a little to do or nothing at all. They get depressed or become psychotic as we do in confined space. If we humans, with such complex brain with the ability to think and act the way no other organism are able to, can go through such psychological conditions within few months, what about the animals, kept for years or their entire life under our control.

Social animals being kept isolated, others being chained, mutilated, forced to bred and killed when they are surplus or no longer needed. But at what cost?

We need to understand that not only humans but all life forms are part of the nature, to work as a system, as a whole, to coexist. All the parts are needed to serve the whole, just as legs, fingers eyes and ears are meant to serve the whole body. We have an extraordinary capacity to show kindness towards our fellow cohabitants and to make a choice to let them be, how they are supposed to be and where.

 

Monalisha Subudhiray