Why are practitioners not realists about animal models of anxiety and depression?
Why are practitioners not realists about animal models of anxiety and depression?

Summary/Abstract: Researchers and practitioners rarely take on a realist attitude about animal models in psychiatry. Why does this happen? I will argue that even the best among current models fail to satisfy two requirements that demand care in balancing them one against the other: the psychological construct requirement and the mechanistic requirement. Failure to satisfy them explains why researchers do not believe in them. I conclude by arguing that, if one were to be a realist about animal models in psychiatry, interventionist and representational aspects of that attitude would be inextricably mixed.

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