ArticlePhysiology & behavior2017
Social housing and social isolation: Impact on stress indices and energy balance in male and female Syrian hamsters (Mesocricetus auratus).
Article in Physiology & behavior, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 25 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
25 citing papers in PubMed, 40 citations in OpenAlex.
- Sex differences in the neural circuitry of aggression.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Distinct subcircuits within the mesolimbic dopamine system encode the salience and valence of social stimuli.Psychopharmacology · 2025Article
- A review of the effects of different types of social behaviors on the recruitment of neuropeptides and neurotransmitters in the nucleus accumbens.Frontiers in neuroendocrinology · 2025Review
- Small mammal owners' experiences of housing challenges and animal welfare: A COM-B and word frequency analysis.Animal welfare (South Mimms, England) · 2025Article
- The deletion of the arginine vasopressin 1a receptor impairs sexual and maternal behavior.Frontiers in endocrinology · 2025Article
- Perineuronal Nets in Syrian Hamsters: Anatomical Localization, Sex Differences, Diurnal Variation, and Response to Social Stress.Brain and behavior · 2024Article
- Sex-dependent regulation of social avoidance by oxytocin signaling in the ventral tegmental area.Behavioural brain research · 2024Article
- Sex differences in the impact of social status on social reward and associated mesolimbic activation.Physiology & behavior · 2024Article
- Article
- Aggression Results in the Phosphorylation of ERK1/2 in the Nucleus Accumbens and the Dephosphorylation of mTOR in the Medial Prefrontal Cortex in Female Syrian Hamsters.International journal of molecular sciences · 2023Article
- What's wrong with my experiment?: The impact of hidden variables on neuropsychopharmacology research.Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2022Review
- Acute administration of fluoxetine increases social avoidance and risk assessment behaviors in a sex- and social stress-dependent manner in Syrian hamsters (Mesocricetus auratus).Pharmacology, biochemistry, and behavior · 2022Article
- Mean Girls: Social Stress Models for Female Rodents.Current topics in behavioral neurosciences · 2022Review
- Estrogen Withdrawal Increases Postpartum Anxiety via Oxytocin Plasticity in the Paraventricular Hypothalamus and Dorsal Raphe Nucleus.Biological psychiatry · 2021Article
- Ingestion of probiotic (Lactobacillus helveticus and Bifidobacterium longum) alters intestinal microbial structure and behavioral expression following social defeat stress.Scientific reports · 2021Article
- Sex-dependent effects of social status on the regulation of arginine-vasopressin (AVP) V1a, oxytocin (OT), and serotonin (5-HT) 1A receptor binding and aggression in Syrian hamsters (Mesocricetus auratus).Hormones and behavior · 2021Article
- Silence, Solitude, and Serotonin: Neural Mechanisms Linking Hearing Loss and Social Isolation.Brain sciences · 2020Review
- Social experience and sex-dependent regulation of aggression in the lateral septum by extrasynaptic δGABAPsychopharmacology · 2020Article
- Effect of Aggressive Experience in Female Syrian Hamsters on Glutamate Receptor Expression in the Nucleus Accumbens.Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience · 2020Article
- Sex-dependent effects of social isolation on the regulation of arginine-vasopressin (AVP) V1a, oxytocin (OT) and serotonin (5HT) 1a receptor binding and aggression.Hormones and behavior · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Although Syrian hamsters are thought to be naturally solitary, recent evidence from our laboratory demonstrates that hamsters may actually prefer social contact. Hamsters increase their preference for a location associated with an agonistic encounter regardless of whether they have "won" or "lost". It has also been reported that social housing as well as exposure to intermittent social defeat or to a brief footshock stressor increase food intake and body mass in hamsters. By contrast, it has also been suggested that housing hamsters in social isolation causes anxiety-induced anorexia and reductions in body mass selectively in females. The purpose of this study was to determine the physiological consequences of housing hamsters in social isolation versus in social groups. Male and female hamsters were housed singly or in stable groups of 5 for 4weeks after which they were weighed and trunk blood was collected. In addition, fat pads and thymus and adrenal glands were extracted and weighed. Serum and fecal cortisol were measured using an enzyme-linked immunoassay. Housing condition had no effect on serum or fecal cortisol, but socially housed hamsters displayed modest thymus gland involution. Socially housed females weighed more than did any other group, and socially housed females and males had more fat than did socially isolated hamsters. No wounding or tissue damage occurred in grouped hamsters. Overall, these data suggest that Syrian hamsters tolerate both stable social housing and social isolation in the laboratory although social housing is associated with some alteration in stress-related and bioenergetic measures.
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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.