1. ¹Mood and Anxiety Disorders Program, Intramural Research Program, National Institute of Mental Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
2. ²Non-Human Primate Neurobiology Research Core, Intramural Research Program, National Institute of Mental Health, Bethesda, MD, USA

Correspondence: Dr JT Winslow, Non-Human Primate Neurobiology Research Core, 16701 Elmer School Road, NIHAC 110/121, Dickerson, MD 20842, USA. Tel: +301 451 2198; Fax: +301 480 4626; E-mail: jameswinslow@mail.nih.gov

Received 19 March 2008; Revised 11 July 2008; Accepted 2 August 2008; Published online 17 September 2008.

Abstract

Non-human primates have been used to model psychiatric disease for several decades. The success of this paradigm has issued from comparable cognitive skills, brain morphology, and social complexity in adult monkeys and humans. Recently, interest in biological psychiatry has focused on similar brain, social, and emotional developmental processes in monkeys. In part, this is related to evidence that early postnatal experiences in human development may have profound implications for subsequent mental health. Non-human primate studies of postnatal phenomenon have generally fallen into three basic categories: experiential manipulation (largely manipulations of rearing), pharmacological manipulation (eg drug-induced psychosis), and anatomical localization (defined by strategic surgical damage). Although these efforts have been very informative each of them has certain limitations. In this review we highlight general findings from the non-human primate postnatal developmental literature and their implications for primate models in psychiatry. We argue that primates are uniquely capable of uncovering interactions between genes, environmental challenges, and development resulting in altered risk for psychopathology.