Oxytocin enhances observational fear in mice
| Autor: | Leah R. Hanson, Marc T. Pisansky, Jonathan C. Gewirtz, Irving I. Gottesman |
|---|---|
| Jazyk: | angličtina |
| Rok vydání: | 2017 |
| Předmět: |
0301 basic medicine
Male Reflex Startle endocrine system media_common.quotation_subject Science General Physics and Astronomy Empathy Stimulation Escape response Oxytocin Amygdala Gyrus Cinguli General Biochemistry Genetics and Molecular Biology Article 03 medical and health sciences 0302 clinical medicine Escape Reaction parasitic diseases medicine Animals Humans lcsh:Science Anterior cingulate cortex Administration Intranasal media_common Multidisciplinary business.industry Brain General Chemistry Fear Oxytocin receptor Mice Inbred C57BL 030104 developmental biology medicine.anatomical_structure Receptors Oxytocin Facilitation Female lcsh:Q business Neuroscience 030217 neurology & neurosurgery hormones hormone substitutes and hormone antagonists medicine.drug |
| Zdroj: | Nature Communications, Vol 8, Iss 1, Pp 1-11 (2017) Nature Communications |
| ISSN: | 2041-1723 |
| DOI: | 10.1038/s41467-017-02279-5 |
| Popis: | Empathy is fundamental to human relations, but its neural substrates remain largely unknown. Here we characterize the involvement of oxytocin in the capacity of mice to display emotional state-matching, an empathy-like behavior. When exposed to a familiar conspecific demonstrator in distress, an observer mouse becomes fearful, as indicated by a tendency to freeze and subsequent efforts to escape. Both intranasal oxytocin administration and chemogenetic stimulation of oxytocin neurons render males sensitive to the distress of an unfamiliar mouse. Acute intranasal oxytocin penetrates the brain and enhances cellular activity within the anterior cingulate cortex, whereas chronic administration produces long-term facilitation of observational fear and downregulates oxytocin receptor expression in the amygdala. None of these manipulations affect fear acquired as a result of direct experience with the stressor. Hence, these results implicate oxytocin in observational fear in mice (rather than fear itself) and provide new avenues for examining the neural substrates of empathy. Oxytocin modulates social behaviours in mammals. Here the authors demonstrate that observational fear, a measure of empathy-like behaviour in rodents, is modulated by oxytocin. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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