Animal Hoarding 115 disagree with a human’s interpretation of how they feel or what they want but the hoarder can believe that animals feel and think exactly like them and want what they want, whether or not they actually Other Factors Genetics Family studies show that object hoarding is more common among first-degree relatives of people with hoarding when compared with non-hoarding controls Pedigree and twin studies suggest that hoarding has a strong genetic component and complex pattern of inheritance However, most of these studies have involved subjects with OCD or other disorders in addition to hoarding symptoms Currently, there is a lack of replication of previous genetic studies (Hirschtritt and Mathews 2014) There have been no studies to date specifically looking at possible genetic contributors specific to animal hoarding Neurophysiology Pathological hoarding behavior potentially involves disruption of brain mechanisms associated with decision-making, general cognitive function, impulsivity, assignment of emotional significance to possessions and anxiety associated with decision-making or separation from such objects or animals The earliest studies of brain function in hoarding patients (Saxena et al 2004) found that, compared to non-hoarding OCD patients, OCD patients with compulsive hoarding had significantly lower glucose metabolism in the dorsal anterior and posterior cingulate gyrus Contemporary studies continue to elucidate other brain regions associated with hoarding symptoms, (Slyne and Tollin 2014), but there have, as yet, been no analyses specific to animal hoarding Recent work has demonstrated how the pro-social hormone oxytocin increases in both dogs and people with certain forms of contact, so it is possible that there may eventually be a neurophysiological explanation for animal hoarding (Beetz et al 2012; Nagasawa et al 2015) Infectious Disease/ Parasites There have been periodic media reports drawing a potential connection between hoarding behavior and infection with the protozoan parasite Toxoplasma gondii commonly associated with cats and cat feces (Gibson 2015) The specific