The
common conception of mental illness or psychopathology is that it’s a breakdown
or malfunction of the human mind; a very personal problem that some individual
must struggle to overcome. While Horacio
Fábrega admits this is true on one level,
he argues that on another level psychopathology
can be seen as a product of evolutionary changes both within the human organism
and within the human environment. More
surprising to me than this is his claim that psychopathology is not only an end
product of the evolutionary process but that psychopathology has actually had
(and is still having) an effect on the course of human evolution.

Fábrega is professor of psychiatry
and anthropology. But he bases his
examination of the evolution of psychopathology on knowledge from a diversity
of fields in both the natural sciences and the social sciences including
paleoanthropology, paleoecology, evolutionary biology, ethology (the scientific study of animal behavior),
evolutionary psychology, archeology, and of course psychology, and psychiatry.

The
book is divided into two main parts in which facts are presented and arguments
are made, and a lesser third part in which the previous facts and arguments are
recapitulated and synthesized. The
first part deals with the relationship between psychiatry and evolutionary
biology and covers topics such as how psychopathology can be defined or
described using the language of evolution, how the universality of
psychopathology may be accounted for by using a biological evolutionary
perspective, how important psychopathology is to a description of the
evolutionary process, and the limits of an evolutionary conception of
psychopathology. Here the discussion
focuses on the important differences between the humanistic perspective on
mental illnesses (which include the
subjective and cultural aspects such as meaning, suffering, social deviance,
moral values, and a community’s response to the sufferer) and the objective or
impersonal perspective (which has to do
with the relationship between mental illnesses and their effect on biological
functions such as survival, reproduction, the stressors within a particular
environment, and natural selection). 
These two points of view are not mutually exclusive, according to Fábrega,
but complementary.

If
psychopathology is in fact a product of evolution then, logically, some
semblance of it ought to be evident in species that were precursors to
humanity, such as apes and higher primates. 
The second part of this book examines observations of non-human species
in their natural habitats, in general captivity, and in laboratory
settings. The collected data seems to
suggest that psychopathology does indeed exist in nonhumans, and especially in
primates. The data allows for the
devising of models of the social ecology of early or archaic human groups, and
for the framing of reasonable assumptions regarding the culture that arose from
the interplay between their language, their cognitive abilities, and their
emotions. These models then provide an
evolutionary baseline for what might have been their normal behavior onto which
hypothetical constructs of mental illness can be arranged. This chapter also considers arguments
against conclusions reached in this way, such as the problem of generalizing
research findings from lower cognitive functioning animals—necessary in
hypothesizing the behaviour of archaic human groups—to higher functioning
humans in matters such as their behavioral responses to psychopathology in one
of their kind. This part also discusses
the importance of the uniquely human condition commonly referred to as altered
states of consciousness, such as might be experienced during “spiritual
enlightenment,” and clinically referred to as dissociation. The author cautions that, while this
state (and related others) is a common
universal experience, it’s definition as either a spiritual experience or a
pathological condition is always culturally dependent.

Throughout this book Fábrega deals with a number of thought-provoking
questions such as, “What essential biological properties of human beings might
explain the genesis and persistence of human behavioral problems?” and “Could
it [psychopathology] have also played a role in human evolution?” (5). He freely admits that specific information
about our distant ancestors is not only very sparse or non-existent, but that
evidence which does exist can be, and has been, interpreted in many different
and contradictory ways. He also
recognizes that any talk about psychopathology runs up against the very real
difficulty of distinguishing between the normal and the so-called
abnormal. So why is the study of
evolution important in relation to psychopathology? Fábrega explains that behavior is based on “evolutionary
residuals [that] are naturally designed mechanisms and systems of
information-handling keyed to basic biological functions of survival and
reproduction” (367). Mental illnesses or “syndromes of
psychopathology” are both physical and mental in nature and are produced when
these “mechanisms and systems of information-handling” suffer what he calls
“harmful perturbations.” Therefor, he
argues, knowing how evolution has shaped the human being in relation to our
environment will help us to understand the origins of psychopathology. But more importantly, an evolutionary
perspective reveals how psychopathology has functioned in helping humans to
adapt to their ever-changing ecological and cultural environment. Psychopathology as adaptation or as an
adaptive mechanism is the focal point of this book.

While
there are many dense passages full of technical language, this is a
well-written book. And though it may be
a struggle for some non-academic readers, I believe anyone interested in the
relationship between animal behavior, the biological, cultural, and ecological
evolution of humankind, and what we humans consider to be psychopathology is
likely to find it well worth the effort.  

© 2002 Peter B. Raabe

Peter B. Raabe
teaches philosophy and has a private practice in philosophical counseling in
North Vancouver, Canada. He is the author of the books Philosophical
Counseling: Theory and Practice (Praeger, 2001) and Issues
in Philosophical Counseling (Praeger, 2002).

Categories: Psychology, Genetics