This is very interesting, and I think a pretty solid theory for some. Part of it fits my situation, but for the most part, this doesn't explain my experience as a therian overall. I also was fixated on animals at a very young age, long before I can remember, but this is where I diverge. While my parents have footage of me as a tiny, tiny pup imitating animals and I did continue to imitate them, for me it went beyond just pretend. I felt like an animal right off the bat, and I'm not neurodivergent or transgender, just asexual which doesn't cause dysphoria or disconnection. I never disassociated from myself until after I had pushed my therianthropy away.

I personally believe there are multiple things that cause therianthropy depending on the person and their situation.

I don't believe in souls, and I don't believe that we are born therians. Some of us may be predisposed to therianthropy, but it is not guaranteed to develop. So what does it take to become one? I see two main ingredients necessary for therianthropy to develop. Those being a connection to an animal, and a disconnect from oneself. The connection can come from a variety of places. People prone to special interests and hyperfixations are far more likely to have this connection. The same goes for people with pets, especially those who had a deep bond with the animal, potentially due to trauma. The disconnect from yourself or reality seems to have several common causes. The first of which is being transgender, which causes you to be uncomfortable in your body and life. Another one is being neurodivergent, which causes you to feel out of place in the world. Trauma and dissociation are very common causes as well, but it can be from anything really. When someone feels disconnected from the world, they will latch onto the animal that they feel connected to for a sense of security and identity. They will begin to project themselves onto the animal, then they will eventually see themselves as the animal. I feel that this recipe for therianthropy explains why so many therians are neurodivergent, mentally ill, and LGBT.
My experience certainly falls under this pattern. I had a special interest in animals from around the age of three, maybe younger. I would play pretend as an animal as much as I possibly could, and learned all that I could about them. Once I started school, I couldn't act like an animal visibly anymore. The school environment was incredibly overstimulating and overwhelming, so I dissociated frequently. I spent hours every single day at school zoned out. While I was dissociating, I engaged in maladaptive daydreaming. In these daydreams I would imagine myself and everyone around me as an animal. I never saw myself as a human, not even once. I wanted to be someone else and somewhere else, and being an animal was my escape. Eventually, this pretending wasn't pretending anymore. I really did see myself as an animal on the inside. That has never gone away.

I reckon I probably got weirdly attached to a particular animal during my horrendous teen years as some sort of comfort thing. Developed species dysphoria and then it stuck and irriversibly changed how I saw myself. That's my best guess.

I believe I am a therian mainly because I feel such a strong sense of belonging with the experiences and people in the community. I feel I relate on such a deeply emotional and psychological level with everything I see people talk about here, all the talk of shifting and feeling othered and having an animal brain seems like exactly me any time I read about it.
Now, to get into the specifics, I have felt like an avian for the longest of times. I knew since I was young that I was meant to have wings and claws and fly freely. But I haven't had the language to express that intuition until the last couple of years.
And that's really all I know lol

For me it's a general disconnect with humanity along with various types of shifts starting from a young age
I've always felt much calmer and more like myself around animals. It's true that a variety of animals don't get along (for example, I've always felt particularly comfortable around cats, when they'd have no problem hunting my theriotype(s)), but I feel like I'm on much more equal standing to them compared to humans. Not to mention a deep yearning for wings and the life of a bird as a whole for as long as I can remember
I've experienced phantom wings on and off for years, and for the same amount of time, have felt like a quadrupedal gait would suit me far better while I lack the light weight and hollow bones of a bird (which probably points to another theriotype I'm still not sure of)
At the core of it, it's a sense of just *knowing* there's some animal part of me

I'm not sure this theory holds up with feline therians since most felines are solitary in nature.

No matter what age, pup or adult; I think we should all be careful of online safety anywhere. Both on tg and off tg.

my personal theory is as follows, based off of what i've seen:

The reason a lot of people put so much emphasis on the amount of canine & feline therians usually stems from the idea of therianthropy being a past life when it comes to Spiritual Therianthropy. This causes an uproar, such as "there can't possibly be so many wolves!" when in reality, there very well could be. (using wolves as my example here since they're the ones that i've seen the most uproar/discourse around.)

In reality, someone could be a wolf-therian due to their soul being wolfen, someone could also be mistaking their werewolf theriotype for a regular wolf (tbh i think this is highly likely. There's not much talk in regards to theriomythics outside of this website, and many feel forced to use the term otherkin even if it doesnt fully fit their experience. I fell into this group myself.).

Also: most of the discourse I've seen completely forgets the existence of psychological therianthropy and tends to view it as a strictly spiritual experience, which does a disservice to the whole community.


I do also think that the social behaviours of said theriotypes can come into play too, like both posts above. So ultimately it's kind of a mix of reasons why there's so many canines and felines.

The first part is an interesting idea. We may just not be seeing the theriotypes that wouldn't seek out these communities as often. I don't think it suggests everyone is a therian though...but it definitely would account for why so many wolves tend to gather together. Not as much in regards to foxes though, who are only semi-social, which is what I noted from meeting others offline as well.

Someone I know had the theory that since canine and feline animals are more social, that could be why there seem to be more, over antisocial animals. Correct me if im wrong, but canine/feline animals tend to seek community over, say, reptiles. It could be that they're more prevalent for that reason.
However, another friend proposed that this theory may suggest that everybody could be a therian. I don't know if I quite agree with that, but it definitely is a proposition.