Abstract
Sardinian alcohol-preferring (sP) rats have been selectively bred for high alcohol preference and consumption. Beside alcohol preference, sP rats display inherent high levels of anxiety-related behaviors (evidenced under multiple experimental procedures).The present study was designed to evaluate whether voluntarily consumed alcohol exerted an anxiolytic effect in adult, male sP rats exposed to the social interaction (SI) test. Alcohol-consuming rats were given alcohol under the homecage 2-bottle “alcohol (10%, v/v) vs water” choice regimen with unlimited access for 15 consecutive days. The SI test was conducted on Day 15 of alcohol drinking, one hour into the dark phase of the daily light/dark cycle. Alcohol intake in alcohol-consuming rats averaged approximately 0.9 g/kg in this first hour of the dark phase. Pairs (n=11) of alcohol-consuming rats displayed approximately 3-fold longer times of SI than pairs (n=10) of alcohol-naive rats. These data(a) suggest that voluntarily alcohol intake exerted an anxiolytic effect in sP rats, (b) extend to a different procedure of experimental “anxiety” previous results obtained using the elevated plus maze test, and (c) strengthen the hypothesis that anxiolysis may represent one of the alcohol effects that drive sP rats to consume high amounts of alcohol.
Highlights
Sardinian alcohol-preferring rats have been selectively bred for high alcohol preference and consumption
When exposed to the 2-bottle “alcohol vs. water” choice regimen, with unlimited access for 24 hours/day, rats in the alcohol-consuming group rapidly acquired alcohol drinking behavior, as indicated by daily alcohol intakes higher than 4 g/kg by Day 5 in each rat
The present study was designed to evaluate whether voluntarily consumed alcohol produced an anxiolytic effect in selectively bred, alcohol-preferring Sardinian alcohol-preferring (sP) rats exposed to the social interaction (SI) test
Summary
Sardinian alcohol-preferring (sP) rats have been selectively bred for high alcohol preference and consumption. The “anxiety” profile of sP rats has been evidenced in several comparisons with their alcohol-avoiding counterpart (named Sardinian alcohol-non preferring rats) [4,5,6,7,8,9,10] as well as in comparison with other selectively bred lines of alcoholpreferring rats [8]
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