Chronic social instability in adult female rats alters social behavior, maternal aggression and offspring development

Abstract

We investigated the consequences of chronic social instability (CSI) during adulthood on social and maternal behavior in females and social behavior of their offspring in a rat model. CSI consisted of changing the social partners of adult females every 2-3 days for 28 days, 2 weeks prior to mating. Females exposed to CSI behaved less aggressively and more pro-socially towards unfamiliar female intruders. Maternal care was not affected by CSI in a standard testing environment, but maternal behavior of CSI females was less disrupted by a male intruder. CSI females were quicker to attack prey and did not differ from control females in their saccharin consumption indicating, respectively, no stress-induced sensory-motor or reward system impairments. Offspring of CSI females exhibited slower growth and expressed more anxiety in social encounters. This study demonstrates continued adult vulnerability to social challenges with an impact specific to social situations for mothers and offspring.

The social instability stress paradigm in rat and mouse: A systematic review of protocols, limitations, and recommendations

“…Another SIS protocol lasted 19 days and cage composition of two mice per cage was also changed daily ( Chatterjee et al, 2009 ). Two studies applied a 28-day SIS protocol to three animals per cage, and cage composition of mice was changed daily ( Dadomo et al, 2018 ) and cage composition of rats was changed three times a week ( Pittet et al, 2017 ). Another SIS protocol lasted 35 days and cage composition of five rats per cage was changed daily ( Tsai et al, 2014 ).…”

“…Twenty-eight-day SIS applied to adult female Sprague-Dawley rats did not affect saccharin preference during the dark phase when tested seven days following SIS termination ( Pittet et al, 2017 ). Likewise, SIS 16D applied to adolescent male Long-Evans rats did not affect sucrose preference when tested immediately or 21 days following SIS termination ( Marcolin et al, 2019 ).…”

Proximity to humans affects local social structure in a giraffe metapopulation

“…Social integration among female horses increases foal birth rates and survival, and decreases harassment by males (Cameron, Setsaas, & Linklater, 2009). Experimentally induced chronic social instability alters alloparental care, and increases anxiety in female rodents and their offspring (Ebensperger et al., 2017; Pittet, Babb, Carini, & Nephew, 2017). In our study we find that proximity to traditional human settlements in a wild mammal population is correlated with the signatures of social systems that have experienced repeated disruptions resulting in instability (Maldonado‐Chaparro et al., 2018).…”

Psychosocial Stress and Immunity—What Can We Learn From Pig Studies?

“…However, human studies on immunomodulating effects of bullying are scarce (Haavet et al, 2004 ; Baldwin et al, 2018 ). While in humans, bullying is just as prevalent in females as in males, female aggression after regrouping is commonly low in mice and rats (Björkqvist, 2001 ) but has been demonstrated in adult female rats in specific social situations (Albert et al, 1988 ; Pittet et al, 2017 ). As aggression after regrouping can reliably be observed in female pigs (Stookey and Gonyou, 1994 ; D'Eath and Pickup, 2002 ), this species could serve as a good model for studying immunomodulatory effects of bullying in an experimental setting.…”