Oestrous phase cyclicity influences judgment biasing in rats.

Autor: Barker TH; School of Animal and Veterinary Sciences, The University of Adelaide, Roseworthy Campus, Roseworthy, South Australia, Australia. Electronic address: timothy.barker@adelaide.edu.au., Kind KL; School of Animal and Veterinary Sciences, The University of Adelaide, Roseworthy Campus, Roseworthy, South Australia, Australia., Groves PD; School of Animal and Veterinary Sciences, The University of Adelaide, Roseworthy Campus, Roseworthy, South Australia, Australia., Howarth GS; School of Animal and Veterinary Sciences, The University of Adelaide, Roseworthy Campus, Roseworthy, South Australia, Australia; Gastroenterology Department, Children, Youth and Women's Health Service, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia., Whittaker AL; School of Animal and Veterinary Sciences, The University of Adelaide, Roseworthy Campus, Roseworthy, South Australia, Australia.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: Behavioural processes [Behav Processes] 2018 Dec; Vol. 157, pp. 678-684. Date of Electronic Publication: 2018 Apr 10.
DOI: 10.1016/j.beproc.2018.03.020
Abstrakt: The identification of cognitive bias has become an important measure of animal welfare. Negative cognitive biases develop from a tendency for animals to process novel information pessimistically. Judgment-bias testing is the commonplace methodology to detect cognitive biases. However, concerns with these methods have been frequently-reported; one of which being the discrepancy between male and female cognitive expression. The current study assessed the factors of social status and oestrus, to investigate whether oestrous cycle rotation, or subordination stress encouraged an increase in pessimistic responses. Female Sprague-Dawley rats (n = 24) were trained on an active-choice judgment bias paradigm. Responses to the ambiguous probe were recorded as optimistic or pessimistic. Oestrous phase was determined by assessing vaginal cytology in stained vaginal cell smears. Rats in the dioestrous phase and those rats considered to be subordinate demonstrated an increased percentage of pessimistic responses. However, no interaction between these factors was observed. This suggests that oestrous cyclicity can influence the judgment biases of female animals; a previously unreported finding. On this basis, researchers should be encouraged to account for both oestrous phase cyclicity and social status as an additional fixed effect in study design.
(Crown Copyright © 2018. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
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