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Updated: Aug 8, 2026
Using Chronic Social Stress to Model Postpartum Depression in Lactating Rodents
Published on: June 10, 2013
Effects of pre- and postnatal stimulation on developmental, emotional, and cognitive aspects in rodents: a review
1UPRES PSY.CO 1780, Laboratoire de Neurobiologie de l'Apprentissage Université de Rouen, Faculté des Sciences, 76821 Mont-Saint-Aignan Cedex, France. pierre.chapillion@epeire.univ-rouen.fr
Insights
Prenatal stress negatively impacts rat pup survival and weight, while environmental enrichment can reverse behavioral deficits. Early handling of pregnant rats may protect offspring from stress effects.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Developmental Psychology
- Behavioral Biology
Background:
- Environmental factors during pregnancy and early life significantly influence neurobehavioral development.
- Prenatal stress and postnatal rearing conditions are critical determinants of offspring behavior.
- Understanding these interactions is crucial for addressing developmental disorders and aging.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the behavioral consequences of prenatal stress in rats.
- To evaluate the impact of environmental enrichment and postnatal handling on neurobehavioral outcomes.
- To explore the protective effects of early maternal handling against stress-induced deficits.
Main Methods:
- Exposure of pregnant rats to acute emotional stress (cat exposure) at specific gestational days.
- Assessment of pup mortality, body weight, emotional reactivity, and cognitive functions.
- Implementation of environmental enrichment and postnatal handling protocols.
- Utilizing classical tests and defensive reaction paradigms to measure behavioral responses.
Main Results:
- Prenatal stress significantly increased pup mortality and decreased body weight.
- Cognitive impairments were observed, varying with the learning task.
- Environmental enrichment ameliorated behavioral abnormalities caused by brain trauma or genetic factors.
- Environmental enrichment also slowed aging effects.
- Postnatal handling demonstrated clear effects on emotional reactivity and anxiety levels in dams and offspring.
Conclusions:
- Prenatal stress has severe detrimental effects on offspring viability and development.
- Environmental enrichment is a powerful tool for restoring neurobehavioral function and mitigating aging.
- Early maternal handling offers potential protection against the negative impacts of stress on offspring.
Abstract:
Interactions between the organism and its environment, during pregnancy as well as during the postnatal period, can lead to important neurobehavioral changes. We briefly review the literature, and successively present the main results from our laboratory concerning the behavioral effects of prenatal stress, differential rearing conditions, and postnatal handling. We show that submitting primiparous DA/HAN rats to an acute emotional stress (exposure to a cat) at gestational day10, 14, or 19 leads to greatly increased mortality of pups and to decreased body weight of surviving animals. The effects of such a stressor on emotional reactivity are less obvious. Cognitive processes are impaired depending on the learning task. Enriched environments restore abnormal behaviors (emotional reactivity, motor skills, motor and spatial learning) due to brain trauma or genetic deficiencies. In any case, environmental enrichment does prevent or slow down aging effects. The effects of postnatal handling noted when using classical tests of emotional reactivity also are clear when defensive reaction paradigms are used. Furthermore, pregnant females that are early handled are less anxious than nonhandled females. We hypothesize that, when subjected to a stressor, the offspring of early-handled females would be protected from the deleterious effects of this stress compared to pups of nonhandled females.
