'They're Like Us,' Elephant Researchers Say

One of the most terrifying cases took place in a circus tent in 1994, when Tyke, an African elephant, mauled her groomer and trainer.

It was a modern-day version of King Kong eerily come to life, when Tyke escaped into the streets of downtown Honolulu, seeking refuge from the gathering armies of law enforcement, until she was eventually gunned down. It took 87 bullets.

"The Tyke footage is particularly disturbing when you look through the eyes of the science, because you understand the behavior that Tyke displays is someone who is incredibly stressed, someone who is so traumatized and so upset. It's very un-elephant like behavior," said Bradshaw.

Elephants have ample reason to fear humans. In the last century their population has been decimated, from an estimated 10 million in the early 1900s to half a million now.

They are slaughtered for the ivory and sport hunting trades, or captured for zoos and circuses. Generations of orphaned herds have become broken, so unlike themselves -- now aggressive and depressed. Bradshaw and her fellow researchers have made a diagnosis that was once thought to be uniquely human: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

"To diagnose an elephant with PTSD is novel, but that's because we have denied elephants the capacity of having a mind, having emotions. All the neuroscience says, yes, it's there, and the behavior confirms it," Bradshaw said.

Bradshaw and her colleagues published these startling findings in the journal Nature.

"How an elephant can be traumatized is seeing, for example, their mother killed with a gun. It's a huge shock," Bradshaw said. "Being taken away from their family, taken away from the herd and put into captivity."

For many elephant orphans, surviving capture is only the beginning of their journey out of Africa, and into a new heart of darkness.

"The trauma stays with the elephant when they're in captivity. They adapt to the life. That's a survival mechanism. Just like human prisoners. Some people can survive, some people cannot," Bradshaw said.

Orphaned Elephants Find Refuge

Sheldrick said she has seen how the elephants change. "When you look at a miserable captive in a zoo, you're not seeing an elephant. You're seeing a tragedy," Sheldrick said.

A tragedy for what elephants have experienced, such as dominance training sessions in some facilities, and what they have not: the space to roam without boundaries.