ArticleBehavioural brain research2025
22 and 50 kHz rat ultrasonic vocalization playback reveals sex differences in behavior and cFos in brain regions associated with affective processing.
Article in Behavioural brain research, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
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.
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.
Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed.
- Targeting PAI-1 with TM5441 Mitigates Chronic Social Stress-Induced Anxiety-Like Behavior and Stress-Induced Increases in Ethanol Intake and Preference.Neurochemical research · 2026Article
- Aversive 22-kHz ultrasonic vocalization playback reveals differences in affective (dys)function following early life adversity in male and female juvenile rats.Behavioural brain research · 2026Article
- Balancing consistency and flexibility: exploring trait and state optimism in rats using the cognitive judgement bias test.Frontiers in veterinary science · 2026Article
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.
Funding
Abstract
Adult rats communicate using ultrasonic vocalization (USV) frequencies indicating negative (22 kHz) or positive (50 kHz) affective states. Playback of USVs can serve as an ethologically translational method to study affective processing in response to socially communicated states. However, few studies have examined behavioral and neural effects of USV playback in both male and female rats. Here, adult male and female Sprague-Dawley rats experienced a 20-min open field test (OFT) with either silence, 22 kHz, or 50 kHz recorded USV playback. Center exploration and locomotor activity were analyzed to characterize sex differences in playback effects. Results suggest that females display greater sensitivity to frequency-specific effects of USV playback in this paradigm compared to males. 50 kHz USV playback evoked an immediate increase in center exploration and locomotor activity in females, indicating the appetitive nature of 50 kHz USVs. Initially, 22 kHz playback inhibited center exploration in the OFT compared to 50 kHz. However, females exhibited a switch in behavioral strategy in response to 22 kHz following prolonged playback. Following OFT, neural activity was quantified via the immediate early gene cFos. Results from cFos quantification showed sex- and region-specific differences in neural recruitment in areas of the brain associated with affective processing, including the prefrontal cortex, amygdala, bed nucleus of the stria terminalis, and nucleus accumbens. Taken together, this work provides a normative baseline for understanding how sex influences behavioral and neural responses to USV playback, which can be leveraged to study anxiety, communication, and affect in an ethologically relevant assay.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
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.