Health benefits from dolphin-assisted therapy are sup-ported by measurements of brain wave patterns, bloodchemistry, brain scans, and cell analysis of patients. Butways to explain these improvements are still being studied.Explanations range from the idea that swimming with dol-phins somehow stimulates the immune system to promotehealing, to the more romantic notion that patients whointeract with dolphins experience such joy that theybecome more “open” to recovery. Some people believe that dolphins are uniquely sensi-tive to the needs of people with disabilities, and seek tohelp them through playful expressions of concern. Thereis a “secret language,” they say, shared by dolphins andpeople with disabilities. Perhaps dolphins communicateboth with sound and with a variety of movements, and areextra-sensitive to the body cues of people who have diffi-culty communicating with others through speech, such asthose with autism or developmental delays.Some say it’s almost as if the dolphins can understand thethoughts and actions of people who are unable to putthese things into words.

Just being in water offers many therapeutic benefits for peo-ple with various types of disability. Its buoyancy can tem-porarily free a person who must spend most of every day ina wheelchair, and a large volume of water provides a con-stant surrounding pressure that can be soothing to someonewith chronic pain and hypersensitive nerve endings. Butadvocates of dolphin-assisted therapy claim a whole rangeof additional benefits for this special form of treatment. Some people who are thought to benefit from swimmingwith dolphins are those with physical disabilities such asspinal cord injuries, cerebral palsy, complications fromstrokes or brain damage from accidents, chronic diseaseslike diabetes or multiple sclerosis, or terminal illnesses,including various types of cancer. Others suffer from psy- chological and emotional disabilities: autism, depression, orother mental illnesses; attention-deficit/hyperactivity disor-der; or Down’s syndrome, for example. Some are victimsof physical and sexual abuse; many are children, who seemto have a natural affinity for animals. But adults, too, aresaid to have benefited from dolphin-assisted therapy. Manypeople report that they feel happy and hopeful after swim-ming with dolphins, and accounts of dramatic, long-lastingimprovements in emotional well-being aren’t hard to find.

Why dolphins? Just as with horses, the answer lies in theunique nature of the animal. Dolphins have held a specialfascination for humans throughout the ages—in fact, dol-phins are prominently featured in several ancient culturesand religions. Another reason dolphins are so deeply rooted in thehuman imagination is their undeniable intelligence.Researchers have determined that even humans may ranksecond to dolphins in brainpower—at least in terms ofbrain size and anatomy. Still another attraction is dolphins’highly refined communication system—so different fromour own but perhaps equally expressive and complex. Adolphin produces clicking sounds from just below its blow-hole. When the sounds hit an object, they bounce back andtell the dolphin where the object is. Dolphins also let out arange of whistles and squeals that distinguish a particulardolphin from other dolphins, and convey emotional statesand other information.With long (8 to 10 feet [2.4 to 3 meters] for an adult),streamlined bodies, an average weight of 400 pounds (181kg), swimming speeds of up to 35 miles (56 km) per hour,and as many as 26 razor-sharp teeth in each side of theirjaws, dolphins are gentle, graceful, and friendly-looking—all traits that humans find comforting and appealing. Thedelicate, curved shape of dolphins’ jaws gives them a con-stant toothy grin. What’s more, most dolphins seem to beintensely interested in humans.