Ham Jackson R, Pellis Sergio M
Department of Neuroscience, University of Lethbridge, Lethbridge, Alberta T1K 3M4, Canada.
iScience. 2025 May 2;28(6):112562. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2025.112562. eCollection 2025 Jun 20.
Rats are social animals living in large groups. Within these groups, juveniles engage in vigorous rough-and-tumble play. Despite their natural ecology, most current studies of their play behavior involve pairs not groups. To investigate play under more naturalistic settings, we examined the play of eight groups of juvenile male rats, with each group comprising six, same-aged peers that lived together. Each group was tested on multiple days over the peak play period (30-40 postnatal days). On any given day, rats showed partner preferences for certain individuals in the group, however, preferences varied from day to day. Despite changes in partner preferences, rats chose to play with partners that engaged in more turn taking and with partners with whom they had more symmetrical play relationships. That some individuals within the group were consistently preferred as play partners while others were consistently avoided may have developmental consequences, with those who are favored gaining greater benefits from their juvenile play experiences.
大鼠是群居的社会性动物。在这些群体中，幼鼠会进行激烈的打闹游戏。尽管它们有这样的自然生态习性，但目前大多数关于它们游戏行为的研究涉及的是成对的大鼠而非群体。为了在更自然的环境中研究游戏行为，我们观察了八组雄性幼鼠的游戏情况，每组由六只同龄且共同生活的同伴组成。在游戏高峰期（出生后30 - 40天），每组在多个日子里接受测试。在任何给定的一天，大鼠对群体中的某些个体表现出伙伴偏好，然而，偏好每天都有所不同。尽管伙伴偏好发生了变化，但大鼠选择与更多进行轮流互动的伙伴以及与它们有更对称游戏关系的伙伴一起玩耍。群体中的一些个体始终被优先选为游戏伙伴，而另一些则始终被回避，这可能会产生发育方面的影响，那些受青睐的个体能从幼年游戏经历中获得更大的益处。
