Sexually divergent expression of active and passive conditioned fear responses in rats
- Northeastern University, United States
- Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, United States
Abstract
Traditional rodent models of Pavlovian fear conditioning assess the strength of learning by quantifying freezing responses. However, sole reliance on this measure includes the de facto assumption that any locomotor activity reflects an absence of fear. Consequently, alternative expressions of associative learning are rarely considered. Here we identify a novel, active fear response ('darting') that occurs primarily in female rats. In females, darting exhibits the characteristics of a learned fear behavior, appearing during the CS period as conditioning proceeds and disappearing from the CS period during extinction. This finding motivates a reinterpretation of rodent fear conditioning studies, particularly in females, and it suggests that conditioned fear behavior is more diverse than previously appreciated. Moreover, rats that darted during initial fear conditioning exhibited lower freezing during the second day of extinction testing, suggesting that females employ distinct and adaptive fear response strategies that improve long-term outcomes.
Article and author information
Author details
Reviewing Editor
- Peggy Mason, University of Chicago, United States
Ethics
Animal experimentation: All procedures were conducted in accordance with the National Institutes of Health Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals and were approved by the Northeastern University Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee protocol # 12-0102R.
Version history
- Received: September 3, 2015
- Accepted: November 12, 2015
- Accepted Manuscript published: November 14, 2015 (version 1)
- Version of Record published: December 23, 2015 (version 2)
Copyright
© 2015, Gruene et al.
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.
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Sexually divergent expression of active and passive conditioned fear responses in rats
eLife 4:e11352.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.11352
Further reading
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Male rats and female rats respond to stress in different ways.
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