Dalla Christina, Pitychoutis Pothitos M, Kokras Nikolaos, Papadopoulou-Daifoti Zeta
Department of Pharmacology, Medical School, University of Athens, Mikras Asias 75, Goudi, 11527, Athens, Greece.
Curr Top Behav Neurosci. 2011;8:97-118. doi: 10.1007/7854_2010_94.
Women are more susceptible than men to certain stress-related psychiatric disorders, such as depression. Preclinical studies aim to understand these sex differences by studying male and female rats in stress models. In this chapter, we review sex differences in behavioural aspects, as well as neurochemical and neurobiological findings derived from acute, repeated and chronic stress models. In particular, we focus on sex differences in depressive-like symptomatology expressed in the forced swim test, the chronic mild stress (CMS) and the learned helplessness models, the Flinders Sensitive Line rats (FSL), which is a genetic model of depression and in the lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced sickness behaviour, a putative inflammatory model of depression. Also, sex differences in stress effects on learning and memory parameters are discussed, because cognitive alterations are often seen in sex-differentiated psychiatric disorders. The observed behavioural alterations are often linked with abnormalities in the endophenotype, such as in hormonal, neurochemical, immune and neuroplasticity indices. From these data, it is clear that all stress models have strengths and limitations that need to be recognized in order to use them effectively in the investigation of sex differences in affective disorders.
女性比男性更容易患某些与压力相关的精神疾病，如抑郁症。临床前研究旨在通过在压力模型中研究雄性和雌性大鼠来了解这些性别差异。在本章中，我们回顾了行为方面的性别差异，以及从急性、重复和慢性压力模型中得出的神经化学和神经生物学研究结果。我们特别关注在强迫游泳试验、慢性轻度应激（CMS）和习得性无助模型、弗林德斯敏感品系大鼠（FSL，一种抑郁症的遗传模型）以及脂多糖（LPS）诱导的疾病行为（一种假定的抑郁症炎症模型）中表现出的类似抑郁症状的性别差异。此外，还讨论了压力对学习和记忆参数影响的性别差异，因为认知改变在性别分化的精神疾病中经常出现。观察到的行为改变通常与内表型异常有关，如激素、神经化学、免疫和神经可塑性指标。从这些数据可以清楚地看出，所有压力模型都有优点和局限性，为了在情感障碍性别差异的研究中有效使用它们，需要认识到这些优缺点。
