Adolescent enrichment partially reverses the social isolation syndrome

• Published in: Brain research. Developmental brain research Vol. 150; no. 2; pp. 103 - 115
• Main Authors: Hellemans, Kim G.C, Benge, Luis C, Olmstead, Mary C
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Netherlands Elsevier B.V 21.06.2004
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adolescent Development - physiology; Analysis of Variance; Animals; Animals, Newborn; Anxiety; Anxiety - physiopathology; Association Learning - physiology; Behavior, Animal - physiology; Body Weight - physiology; Cerebral Cortex - pathology; Cortical thickness; Habituation, Psychophysiologic; Humans; Isolation-rearing; Locomotor activity; Male; Maze Learning - physiology; Models, Animal; Motivation; Motor Activity - physiology; Pain; Pain Measurement - methods; Pain Threshold - physiology; Rats; Rats, Long-Evans; Resocialization; Social Environment; Social Isolation; Spatial Behavior - physiology; Time Factors; Isolation-rearing; Pain; Cortical thickness; Resocialization; Motivation and emotion; Anxiety; Neural basis of behavior; Locomotor activity

Early environmental experience produces profound neural and behavioural effects. For example, animals reared in isolation show increased anxiety, neophobia, and poorer performance in learning and spatial memory tasks. We investigated whether later enrichment reverses some or all of the deficits indu...