Animal models for human sexuality

Abstract

The value of animal models in biomedical research is firmly established, and many basic principles of human psychology have been explicated as the result of comparative studies. There is pressing need for non-human models in the behavioural sciences as represented by psychiatry, psychology and ethology; and such models should be constructed, provided their validity can be assured. Valid models cannot be based exclusively on similarity in the formal properties of behaviour. Commonality of descriptive terms as applied to different species does not guarantee identity of the concepts to which the terms apply. Model builders must evaluate interspecific similarities and differences in the causes, mediating mechanisms and functional outcomes of behaviour. The validity of interspecific generalization can never exceed the reliability of intraspecific analysis; and the latter is an indispensable antecedent of the former. Existing and potential models for homosexuality and other psychosexual characteristics of human beings are evaluated within the perspective provided by the foregoing generalizations.