Monoaminergic mediation of female sexual behavior.

Lordotic behavior was facilitated in estrogen-primed female rats by direct application of progesterone or serotonergic or beta-adrenergic receptor blockers to specific telencephalic, anterior hypothalamic-medial preoptic, or posterior hypothalamic sites. Blockade of the alpha-adrenergic system was ineffective in facilitating lordosis, as was the application of the active drugs to control sites in the thalamus or basal ganglia. Female soliciting behavior was not evoked by any of the treatments. It is concluded that the lordotic behavior component of the female rat's estrous behavior pattern is inhibited by a specific central monoaminergic system that also responds to progesterone. Soliciting behavior appears to be mediated by systems that are anatomically, and possibly neurochemically, separable from those regulating lordosis.