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The “isolation syndrome” in mice

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Abstract

Isolation has been widely described to induce a strong aggressive behavior in many animal species and expecially in rodents.

However, a deeper analysis of such altered behavior induced by isolation, allows the identification, at least in mice, of several other changes involving numerous peripheral, behavioral and neurochemical functions, in such a way to debouch into a complex symptomatology. As a consequence of the manifold aspects involved in this experimental situation, the definition “isolation syndrome” seems to be much more adequate than the simplest definition of “aggressiveness by isolation”. On this frame work, some similarities with psychoneurosis in men are also suggested.

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    L. Valzelli

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Valzelli, L. The “isolation syndrome” in mice. Psychopharmacologia 31, 305–320 (1973). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00421275

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