Weber Elin M, Zidar Josefina, Ewaldsson Birgit, Askevik Kaisa, Udén Eva, Svensk Emma, Törnqvist Elin
Department of Animal Environment and Health, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, 532 23 Skara, Sweden.
Department of Animal Environment and Health, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, 750 07 Uppsala, Sweden.
Animals (Basel). 2022 Dec 30;13(1):143. doi: 10.3390/ani13010143.
Aggression among group-housed male mice is a major animal welfare concern often observed at animal facilities. Studies designed to understand the causes of male mice aggression have used different methodological approaches and have been heterogeneous, using different strains, environmental enrichments, housing conditions, group formations and durations. By conducting a systematic literature review based on 198 observed conclusions from 90 articles, we showed that the methodological approach used to study aggression was relevant for the outcome and suggested that home cage observations were better when studying home cage aggression than tests provoking aggression outside the home cage. The study further revealed that aggression is a complex problem; one solution will not be appropriate for all animal facilities and all research projects. Recommendations were provided on promising tools to minimize aggression, based on the results, which included what type of environmental enrichments could be appropriate and which strains of male mice were less likely to be aggressive.
群居雄性小鼠之间的攻击行为是动物设施中经常观察到的一个主要动物福利问题。旨在了解雄性小鼠攻击行为原因的研究采用了不同的方法，而且存在异质性，使用了不同的品系、环境富集方式、饲养条件、分组形式和持续时间。通过基于90篇文章的198条观察结论进行系统的文献综述，我们表明用于研究攻击行为的方法与结果相关，并建议在研究笼内攻击行为时，笼内观察比在笼外诱发攻击行为的测试更好。该研究进一步揭示，攻击行为是一个复杂的问题；一种解决方案并不适用于所有动物设施和所有研究项目。基于研究结果，提供了关于有望将攻击行为降至最低的工具的建议，其中包括哪种类型的环境富集可能合适，以及哪些品系的雄性小鼠攻击性较小。
