Evidence map›Paper›PMID 30151183›Full record

ReviewEcology and evolution2018

Associations between glucocorticoids and sociality across a continuum of vertebrate social behavior.

Aura Raulo, Ben Dantzer

Open access · goldAbstract readReview
In one paragraph

Review in Ecology and evolution, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 26 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
26citing papers in PubMed
12.0field-weighted citation impact, top 2% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

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.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

26 citing papers in PubMed, 79 citations in OpenAlex.

  1. Article
  2. Non-Invasive Assessment of Adrenal Activity in the Subterranean RodentAnimals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2026
    Article
  3. Article
  4. Article
  5. Why not both? A case study in measuring cortisol and corticosterone.Integrative organismal biology (Oxford, England) · 2025
    Article
  6. Article
  7. Article
  8. Article
  9. Review
  10. Article
  11. Article
  12. Article
  13. Glucocorticoid metabolites in anConservation physiology · 2023
    Article
  14. Article
  15. Review
  16. Article
  17. Article
  18. Article
  19. Review
  20. Molecular and neurocircuitry mechanisms of social avoidance.Cellular and molecular life sciences : CMLS · 2021
    Review
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

2 authors at 2 institutions in 3 countries.

Aura RauloDepartment of Biosciences University of Helsinki Helsinki Finland.
Ben DantzerDepartment of Psychology University of Michigan Ann Arbor Michigan.
Michigan United · USUniversity of Helsinki · FI

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

The causes and consequences of individual differences in animal behavior and stress physiology are increasingly studied in wild animals, yet the possibility that stress physiology underlies individual variation in social behavior has received less attention. In this review, we bring together these study areas and focus on understanding how the activity of the vertebrate neuroendocrine stress axis (HPA-axis) may underlie individual differences in social behavior in wild animals. We first describe a continuum of vertebrate social behaviors spanning from initial social tendencies (proactive behavior) to social behavior occurring in reproductive contexts (parental care, sexual pair-bonding) and lastly to social behavior occurring in nonreproductive contexts (nonsexual bonding, group-level cooperation). We then perform a qualitative review of existing literature to address the correlative and causal association between measures of HPA-axis activity (glucocorticoid levels or GCs) and each of these types of social behavior. As expected, elevated HPA-axis activity can inhibit social behavior associated with initial social tendencies (approaching conspecifics) and reproduction. However, elevated HPA-axis activity may also enhance more elaborate social behavior outside of reproductive contexts, such as alloparental care behavior. In addition, the effect of GCs on social behavior can depend upon the sociality of the stressor (cause of increase in GCs) and the severity of stress (extent of increase in GCs). Our review shows that the while the associations between stress responses and sociality are diverse, the role of HPA-axis activity behind social behavior may shift toward more facilitating and less inhibiting in more social species, providing insight into how stress physiology and social systems may co-evolve.

Indexed as

animal personalitycooperationcooperative breedingglucocorticoidshypothalamic‐pituitary‐adrenal axispair‐bondparental caresocial behaviorstress

Identifiers

PMID30151183
PMCPMC6106170
OpenAlexW2810156885

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceCC BY
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

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.