Projects

Listen, reflect, and learn. These words summarize the Kerulos research philosophy. Science has amassed a huge volume of knowledge, sadly much of it at the expense of animals. Kerulos is committed to research and learning that respects individual well-being and focuses on deepening understanding of how animals think and feel, and what they value. We do not support research that causes distress, jeopardizes an individual's mental, emotional, or physical health, nor subordinates an animal’s wellbeing and dignity to human achievements.

One of our main objectives is to articulate the theory and practice of animal psychology and psychotherapy. This work expands perceptions and knowledge beyond concepts that objectify animals. In the past, scientifically, legally, and culturally, animals have been classified as "less" than humans. Today, science and sensibility dispel this myth. The scientific recognition that animals share things once thought uniquely human—including culture, emotions, self-awareness, even language—has catalyzed the founding of trans-species psychology. Under this new paradigm, knowledge about ourselves can be used to study animals and to help all species.

Kerulos research and education are designed to achieve this objective. Research at Kerulos explores new and traditional ways of thinking and behaving that bring mutual wellbeing for people and animals. This learning and knowledge is communicated in diverse ways: scientific publications, documentaries, public and scientific presentations, magazine articles, texts, workshops, and other educational materials.

Project Titles (click to view descriptions)

Becoming Parrot: Creating Sanctuary for Parrots

Building an Inner Sanctuary: Complex Trauma Recovery of Chimpanzees Project

Mambo: Northern Uganda Elephant and Community Restoration Project

The Elephant Post-Traumatic Stress Project

Equine Trauma Therapy

Project Descriptions

Becoming Parrot: Creating Sanctuary for Parrots

Like elephants and primates, Psittaciformes (parrots, lories, cockatoos, parakeets) have a "social brain." They live in a complex web of relationships and form deep, lasting bonds. Much of their lifetime, they gather in flocks that may number in the thousands. Parrots are renowned for their keen abilities, and willingness, to cross cultures and engage linguistically and socially with humans.

In the wild, parrots are subject to dramatic habitat loss and the breakdown of flock life as they are increasingly sought and captured for the pet bird trade. Once in captivity, if they are able to survive the harsh conditions of transport for sale, most endure depauperate conditions, often kept in isolation with little or no social interaction and a deficit of the usual emotional bonding that earmarks parrot society. Neglect, isolation, premature weaning, poor rearing and poor nutrition and habitat critcally disturb normal parrot life and introduce stress that affects mental and physical health.

It is important to appreciate that not all parrots are the same. Each species of parrot has their own culture and ways of being. Likewise, individuals within a species differ from one another. As such, an individual parrot’s personality, species, genetics, and experience contribute to differences in his or her susceptibility to stress and the ability to cope with change. This affects an individual's recovery trajectory, coping skills, and behaviour. Because captivity represents such a significant departure from conditions to which parrots are evolutionarily, ecologically, and psychologically adapted, it is in fact "institutionalized trauma." Traumatic and stressful experiences underlie “problem bird behaviours.”

Parrots show their symptoms in diverse ways, for example, self–mutilation, stereotypic behaviour, emotional dysregulation, aggression, depression, and illness. In the framing of trans-species psychology, such "problem behaviours" are seen as efforts to cope with environmental and emotional conditions and communicate their distress. The "problem" lies with demand that captive life imposes on a parrot, not the parrot.

The Kerulos Center studies the ecological and experiential bases of parrot psychology and psychotherapeutic approaches to their recovery in collaboration with two sanctuaries in California, the Santa Barbara Bird Farm and The Association for Parrot C.A.R.E. The Center is also establishing the J'Attendrai Bird Sanctuary that will provide refuge and care for parrots in need, with particular emphasis for elderly abandoned birds. It will also serve as a teaching facility for trans-species therapy interns.

Through the Eyes of Parrots

The Kerulos Center is partnering with the Santa Barbara Bird Farm and The Association for Parrot C.A.R.E. on several projects including Through the Eyes of Parrots: Parrot Sanctuary Design to Facilitate Recovery and Improve Wellbeing For Long-Term Psittacine Captives. The project develops formal protocols for intake, care, residence design, volunteer training, monitoring, and evaluation for sanctuaries that care for parrots. There will be a web-based manual coupled with training courses that illustrate and teach how to support parrot individuation and wellbeing in captivity: how we can each become "more parrot."

Birds of a Feather: Trans-species Parrot-Veteran Recovery Project

In another collaboration with The Association for Parrot C.A.R.E., Kerulos is working with Dr. Lorin Lindner, to study the theory and practice of a unique ecotherapeutic program she originally conceived. It is located at Serenity Park, on the grounds of the West Los Angeles VA Medical Center, Serenity Park Sanctuary refuge brings together military veterans and abandoned parrots in a remarkable program that brings healing and new meaning for both.

Publications and Media Coverage

Fishbein, S. (2007). Getting a wing up. U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Vanguard. March/April. Retrieved April 1 from www1.va.gov/opa/feature/vanguard/07maraprVG.pdf

Lindner, L & G.A. Bradshaw, in prep. Birds of a feather: Reciprocal recovery in Parrot and Veteran Trauma Survivors. Psychological Bulletin.

Orosz, S. & G.A. Bradshaw in press. Neuroanatomy of the companion avian parrot. The Veterinary Clinics of North American: Exotic Animal Practice. (eds. L. Tell & M. Knipe)

Building an Inner Sanctuary: Chimpanzee and Orangutan Trauma and Recovery

Chimpanzees and other animals are routinely used in biomedical research. Captivity, social isolation, severe emotional duress, and psychophysiological traumatization from repeated experiments are conditions that often lead to the development of Complex Post- Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Similar symptoms are seen in humans who have endured political imprisonment, domestic abuse, and other forms of systematic violence.

In conjunction with several sanctuaries, Kerulos is engaged in a series of studies on trauma in resident chimpanzees and orangutans, including diagnosis, treatment, and recovery. Residents have come to sanctuary after spending many years in the entertainment industry and/or as biomedical laboratory subjects. These studies constitute the first formal psychological and psychiatric assessments of nonhuman animals. Another goal is to understand the relationship between the works of sanctuary professionals and psychotherapists. In this, not only do we learn how human psychotherapy can benefit animals, but also what animals can teach humans.

Publications

Bradshaw, G.A. et al. (2008). Building an inner sanctuary: trauma-induced symptoms in non-human great apes. Journal of Trauma and Dissociation, 9(1), 9-34.

Bradshaw, G.A. et al. (in review). More than Kin: Effects of Trauma and Cross-Fostering in Chimpanzees. Developmental Psychology.

Durham, D. & D. Merskin. (In press.) Animals, agency and authority: A discourse analysis of institutional animal care and use committee rhetoric. Animals and Agency. Sarah MacFarland and Ryan Hediger Eds. (eds.)

Mambo: Northern Uganda Elephant and Community Restoration Project

The Kerulos Center is partnered with Dr. Eve Lawino Abe of the Peter and Irene Abe Center for Excellence (PIACE) in a project devoted to the regeneration of Acholi people, elephants, and land. In the course of a twenty year civil war, Ugandan cultures have been fragmented by a pattern of violence. On humans as well as animals, the effect has been profound as exemplified by the decimation of the Elephant, ancient and lasting totem of the Acholi people. For centuries the Acholi shared a deep spiritual connection with nature, but in the current strife, people are waging war against their kindred species.

Through the construction of a Community Care Center for Orphans and Elephants (anticipated opening, June 2008), this project seeks to bring together cultural knowledge, traditions, and ecology of Northern Uganda to restore a sense of meaning and coherency. The Community Care Center is coupled with the Wildlife Care Centre located nearby that is being established to help orphaned elephants and other injured wildlife recover. At the Wildlife Centre, children will learn how to rehabilitate the animals and in so doing rekindle knowledge and ways of being that support elephant and humans communities together.

Publications

Bradshaw, G.A. & E.L. Abe. (2006). Elephant and Human Relationships. In Encyclopedia of animal-human relationships, M. Bekoff (Ed.). Greenwood Press.

The Elephant Post-Traumatic Stress Project

Elephants in the close confinement captivity of zoos and circuses live in chronic stress, deprivation, and pain even when direct physical punishment is not employed. While culturally-engrained images of performing animals and wildlife exhibits may evoke nostalgia and fascination in humans, the experience of animals in captivity is far different. The measure of elephant suffering can perhaps be best appreciated when we take into account the radical differences between captivity and the wild habitats to which they are ecologically and evolutionarily adapted.

Elephants coming to sanctuary experience tremendous improvements, yet often carry the scars of their past experience. We are studying the effects of psychological trauma in individual elephant residents, in particular Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and other trauma-induced conditions, along with methods of recovery. We are also initiating a study in South Africa with Animal Rights Africa and SanWild to study the development of elephant culture after sustaining severe trauma and in the absence of elders and learned traditions.

Combined with studies on freeranging elephant societies, this work lays the foundation for Elephant psychology and psychotherapies. Diagnostic and psychotherapeutic methods are being developed to combine principles of ethology, psychology, and traditional healing together to support elephant recovery, healing, and well-being.

Publications

Bradshaw, G.A. (2008). Inside looking out: neuroethological compromise effects on elephants in captivity. In D. L. Forthman, L.F.Kane, & P. F. Waldau (Eds), An Elephant in the Room: the Science and Well-being of Elephants in Captivity. North Grafton, MA: Tufts Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine's Center for Animals and Public Policy.

Bradshaw, G.A.(2007). Elephants in circuses: analysis of practice, policy, and the future. Policy Paper, Animals and Society Institute.

Bradshaw, G.A. & A.N. Schore. (2007). How elephants are opening doors: developmental neuroethology, attachment, and social context. Ethology, 113, 426–436.

Bradshaw, G.A , A.N. Schore, J.L. Brown, J.H. Poole, and C. J. Moss. (2005). Elephant breakdown. Nature vol. 433: 807.

Equine Trauma Therapy

Much can be accomplished to aid recovery from trauma by simply removing the stressors that have caused or threaten to cause trauma and providing physical and emotional care. However, the lesson that traumatology teaches is that these experiences can never be erased—a person may "recover" but they are changed. In some case, specific, gentle therapeutic approaches may be used in addition to help an individual work through the legacy of the traumatic event. Kerulos is working on various projects that explore various methods found to be successful for people for the care of animals. One project includes the use of Bilateral Equine Tapping (BET) for horses.

BET was developed by Dr. Vera Muller-Paisner to help horses work through trauma. It is based on a method that has had yielded positive results for humans, Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR). Adapted for BET, EMDR is effective in reducing anxiety and stress stemming from a variety of traumatic stressors.

Generally, a horse's natural response is to flee from something fearful. Like other mammals, horses have learned to be able to survive by relying on their “right brain”. Whenever triggered, they respond to what they conceive as danger with an immediate flight response. In the wild and in a herd situation, they take turns relaxing. They depend on others to keep watch for danger, while they lower their alarm threshold, and use the logical cognitive and interactive left brain to explore for choice morsels of food and to interact with other members of the herd. Domesticated, and thereby "bicultural" (living between horse and human cultures, and totally dependent on humans for their care and survival), they are typically separated from the herd, sold repeatedly, and abused, with the result that traumas become engrained and not addressed. When an old memory is coupled with anxiety, it may cause a re-experience or “flashback” to the old disturbance. There is no discharge, only the same response every time. Further, trauma can be readily transmitted from human to horse and horse to human.

BET uses light "tappers" on alternate sides of the body, which crosses the Corpus Callosum and allows intercortical communication between the left and right brain hemispheres. The theory is that the tapping, with the use of simultaneous specific protocols, creates the possibility of experiencing a fearful event differently thereby disconnecting the anxiety from the memory. Once the memory is divested from its emotional trigger, it obtains a different value and no longer creates a high level of fear response. This approach is being researched and also the relationship between horse and human trauma.

Muller-Paisner, V. (In press) After a traumatic fall. Dressage Today.