ReviewNeuroscience and biobehavioral reviews2016
The neurobiology of social play and its rewarding value in rats.
Review in Neuroscience and biobehavioral reviews, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 162 papers.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
162 citing papers in PubMed, 321 citations in OpenAlex.
- The developing adolescent brain: Implications for youth justice and children in criminal proceedings.Developmental cognitive neuroscience · 2026Article
- Characterization of nucleus accumbens dopamine dynamics during positive and negative operant reinforcement in rats.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Sex-specific regulation of social play in juvenile rats by oxytocin neurons in the hypothalamus and oxytocin signaling in the nucleus accumbens.Hormones and behavior · 2026Article
- Aging effects on emotionality, cognition and brain mononuclear cells in Sprague-Dawley rats of both sexes.npj aging · 2026Article
- Neural Mechanisms of Social Homeostasis: Dynamic Range Plasticity.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2026Review
- Aberrant type 2 dopamine and mu-opioid receptor availability in autism spectrum disorder.European journal of nuclear medicine and molecular imaging · 2026Article
- Prenatal Alcohol Exposure: Impact on Neuroimmune Function in the Stress Response and Pain.Advances in experimental medicine and biology · 2026Review
- Nonlinear and sex-specific effects of V1aR deletion on juvenile social behavior.Frontiers in endocrinology · 2026Article
- Article
- To play or not to play? Effects of social isolation length and stimulus rat familiarity on social play engagement in three laboratory rat strains.Physiology & behavior · 2025Article
- From welfare indicator to welfare contributor: the role of play in building flexibility and resilience in captive animals.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2025Review
- Comparative gene editing reduces dopamine receptor levels across rodent species.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Timing matters: modeling the effects of gestational cannabis exposure on social behavior and microglia in the developing amygdala.Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2025Article
- Declines in Oxytocin Receptor Density and Social Behavior Across a Dispersal-Like Transition in Solitary Hamsters.Developmental neurobiology · 2025Article
- Through Human Eyes: Owner Insights into the Social Relationships of Pet Rats.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2025Article
- Continuous monitoring and machine vision reveals that developing gerbils exhibit structured social behaviors prior to the emergence of autonomy.PLoS biology · 2025Article
- Zebrafish as a Model Organism for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder: Insights into Stress Mechanisms and Behavioral Assays.Biology · 2025Review
- Linking individual fitness to the evolution of cognition.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Review
- Groups of familiar male rats form unstable partner preferences when play fighting during the juvenile period.iScience · 2025Article
- Opioid Regulation of Social Homeostasis: Connecting Loneliness to Addiction.Biological psychiatry · 2025Review
102 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
In the young of many mammalian species, including humans, a vigorous and highly rewarding social activity is abundantly expressed, known as social play behaviour. Social play is thought to be important for the development of social, cognitive and emotional processes and their neural underpinnings, and it is disrupted in pediatric psychiatric disorders. Here, we summarize recent progress in our understanding of the brain mechanisms of social play behaviour, with a focus on its rewarding properties. Opioid, endocannabinoid, dopamine and noradrenaline systems play a prominent role in the modulation of social play. Of these, dopamine is particularly important for the motivational properties of social play. The nucleus accumbens has been identified as a key site for opioid and dopamine modulation of social play. Endocannabinoid influences on social play rely on the basolateral amygdala, whereas noradrenaline modulates social play through the basolateral amygdala, habenula and prefrontal cortex. In sum, social play behaviour is the result of coordinated activity in a network of corticolimbic structures, and its monoamine, opioid and endocannabinoid innervation.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.