Neuroscience Research Center, Institute of Neuropharmacology, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran.
Neuroscience Research Center, Institute of Neuropharmacology, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran; Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
Pharmacol Biochem Behav. 2022 Feb;213:173318. doi: 10.1016/j.pbb.2021.173318. Epub 2021 Dec 30.
Adverse early life experiences influence behavioral and physiological functions and increase vulnerability to neuropsychiatric disorders. Maternal separation (MS) is an established animal model that reproduces the features of chronic stress or adverse experiences during early life. Previous studies have been shown that MS may lead to impairments of social behaviors. Here, we investigated the effects of MS on mutual reward preferences in a double T-maze prosocial choice task. Since enriched environment (EE) and intranasal oxytocin (OT) administration have beneficial effects on cognition and social behaviors, in the present study we tested whether these treatments, alone or in combination, would affect prosocial behavior of rats which underwent MS during infancy. Rat pups underwent MS paradigm for 180 min/day from postnatal day (PND) 1-21. From PND 22-34, rats were exposed to an EE and/or received intranasal OT (2 μg/μl, 7 days). Hence, the 8 groups consisted of control (CTRL), MS, CTRL+EE, CTRL+OT and the saline groups. Assessment of prosocial choice behavior was started in adolescence. MS impaired prosocial choice behavior and reduced mutual reward preferences. Getting exposed to EE and intranasal OT administration could overcome MS-induced deficits and promoted mutual reward preferences of MS rats. Combination of short-term EE and OT strengthened prosocial behavior. Obtained results showed that EE and OT may be considered as profitable therapeutic approaches for promoting some aspects of social behavior.
不良的早期生活经历会影响行为和生理功能，并增加患神经精神疾病的脆弱性。母体分离 (MS) 是一种已建立的动物模型，可复制生命早期慢性应激或不良经历的特征。先前的研究表明，MS 可能导致社交行为障碍。在这里，我们在双 T 迷宫亲社会选择任务中研究了 MS 对相互奖励偏好的影响。由于丰富环境 (EE) 和鼻内催产素 (OT) 给药对认知和社交行为有有益的影响，因此在本研究中，我们测试了这些治疗方法，单独或联合使用，是否会影响在婴儿期经历 MS 的大鼠的亲社会行为。新生大鼠从出生后第 1 天到第 21 天每天接受 MS 范式 180 分钟。从 PND 22-34 开始，大鼠暴露于 EE 中，或接受鼻内 OT（2μg/μl，7 天）。因此，8 组包括对照组（CTRL）、MS 组、CTRL+EE 组、CTRL+OT 组和盐水组。亲社会选择行为的评估在青春期开始。MS 损害了亲社会的选择行为，减少了相互奖励的偏好。暴露于 EE 和鼻内 OT 给药可以克服 MS 诱导的缺陷，促进 MS 大鼠的相互奖励偏好。短期 EE 和 OT 的组合增强了亲社会行为。研究结果表明，EE 和 OT 可被视为促进某些社交行为的有益治疗方法。
