Critters System

The peer-reviewed scientific journal Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews published an article about therianthropy in their July 2025 issue. The first author of the article, Jan Dirk Blom, is a professor of Professor of Social and Behavioural Sciences at Leiden University in the Netherlands. The second author, Brian Andrew Sharpless, is a clinical psychologist practicing and licensed in Maryland and Virginia. In the past, Sharpless has published together with Blom about Cotard's Delusion (in which people believe they are dead), and Blom has spoken to popular media as an expert on clinical lycanthropy to explain how it compares and contrasts with otherkin.

Here is the APA citation and abstract for their new article:

Blom, J. D., & Sharpless, B. A. (2025). A systematic review on clinical therianthropy and a proposal to conceptualize zoomorphism as a diagnostic spectrum. Neuroscience and biobehavioral reviews, 174, 106193. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106193

"Clinical therianthropy involves the delusional belief that one transforms into an animal and assumes its characteristics. We conducted a systematic review and identified 77 published cases. Of the many theriotypes reported, 68 % involved transformations into canines. Men debuted at a significantly earlier age than women; duration ranged from days (25 %) to weeks (12 %), months (33 %), and years (31 %). Associated conditions included psychotic disorders (41 %), psychotic depression (24 %), bipolar disorder (18 %), and Cotard's syndrome (12 %), while 16 % engaged in other-directed physical violence. Treatment resulted in full remission (58 %) and partial remission (33 %) of the symptoms of clinical therianthropy, although the associated conditions were often chronic in nature and overall prognosis tended to be poor. We also discuss the history and reported etiologies of clinical therianthropy and propose a 'two-hit' pathophysiological model involving cenesthesiopathy and delusion formation. Diagnostic, therapeutic and forensic implications are also discussed. Lastly, we provide suggestions for a diagnostic spectrum that includes clinical and non-clinical cases, the latter comprising therians, furries, otherkin, and other people who experience varying levels of identification with animals."

You can legitimately read their full article for free.

I'm posting about this immediately after having spotted it in my RSS feed, because I don't want to further delay the news about a peer-reviewed article. Later, I'll do a deep reading and write a marginalia on it. Here are some of my thoughts about the wording of this abstract, from my background as a community historian. Before the therian community developed in the 1990s, psychologists have interchangeably called clinical lycanthropy "therianthropy" to acknowledge that the delusions can be about transformation into species other than wolves. However, "theriotype" is a slang word that originated in the online therian community. This concerns me about the degree to which the authors take care to differentiate between the clinical and non-clinical, in conceptual framework as well as in subjects. I encourage you to read their article and share your thoughts on it in the comments to this Dreamwidth post, where I'll post some of my thoughts later as well.