Early Social Isolation in Male Long-Evans Rats Alters Both Appetitive and Consummatory Behaviors Expressed during Operant Ethanol Self-administration

摘要

BackgroundPost-weaning social isolation in rats produces profound and long-lasting cognitive and behavioral deficits in adult animals. Importantly, this housing manipulation alters sensitivity to a number of drugs of abuse including ethanol. However, most studies with ethanol have utilized continuous or limited home cage access to examine interactions between juvenile social experience and drinking. More recently, social isolation was shown to increased ethanol responding in a ‘dipper’ model of self-administration ( Alcohol. Clin. Exper. Res. 31: 1692−1698). In the current study, we utilize a ‘sipper’ operant self-administration model to distinguish the effects of isolation rearing on ethanol seeking- and drinking-related behaviors.