Departments of Psychology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1202 W Johnson Street, Madison, WI 53705, USA.
Proc Biol Sci. 2013 May 22;280(1763):20130824. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2013.0824. Print 2013 Jul 22.
Maternal behaviour has profound, long-lasting implications for the health and well-being of developing offspring. In the monogamous California mouse (Peromyscus californicus), care by both parents is critical for offspring survival. We tested the hypothesis that similar to maternal care in rodents, paternal huddling and grooming (HG) behaviour can be transmitted to future generations via behavioural mechanisms. In California mice, testosterone maintains paternal HG behaviour. In the present study, we randomly assigned a group of male California mice to castration or sham-operated conditions and allowed them to raise their offspring normally. Adult sons of these males were paired with a female, and they were observed interacting with their own offspring. We found that like their fathers, the sons of castrated males huddled and groomed their young at lower levels than the sons of sham-operated fathers. The sons of castrates also retrieved pups more frequently. When both parents were present, the sons of castrates also showed a trend towards engaging in less exploratory behaviour. These data support the hypothesis that paternal behaviour, like maternal behaviour, can be transferred to future generations via epigenetic mechanisms and suggest that in a biparental species both parents contribute to offspring behavioural development.
母性行为对发育中后代的健康和幸福有着深远而持久的影响。在一夫一妻制的加州鼠（Peromyscus californicus）中，父母双方的照顾对后代的生存至关重要。我们检验了一个假设，即类似于啮齿动物的母性行为，父代拥抱和梳理（HG）行为可以通过行为机制传递给后代。在加州鼠中，睾丸激素维持着父代 HG 行为。在本研究中，我们随机分配一组雄性加州鼠进行阉割或假手术处理，并允许它们正常抚养后代。这些雄性的成年儿子与一只雌性配对，并观察它们与自己的后代互动。我们发现，与它们的父亲一样，被阉割雄性的儿子拥抱和梳理幼崽的次数比假手术父亲的儿子要少。被阉割的雄性儿子也更频繁地取出幼崽。当父母双方都在场时，被阉割的雄性儿子也表现出探索行为减少的趋势。这些数据支持了这样一种假设，即父性行为，就像母性行为一样，可以通过表观遗传机制传递给后代，并表明在双亲物种中，父母双方都为后代的行为发育做出了贡献。
