Anxiety and otovestibular disorders: linking behavioral phenotypes in men and mice

Human anxiety and vestibular disorders have long been known to co-occur. Paralleling human clinical and non-clinical data, mounting genetic, pharmacological and behavioral evidence confirms that animal anxiety interplays and co-exists with vestibular/balance deficits. However, relatively few animal models have addressed the nature of this relationship. This paper examines side-by-side human psychiatric and otovestibular phenotypes with animal experimentation data, and outlines future directions of translational research in this field. Discussed here are recently developed specific animal models targeting this interplay, other traditional animal tests sensitive to altered anxiety and vestibular domains, and the existing problems with translation of animal data into human phenotypes. The role of hearing deficits and their contribution to anxiety and vestibular phenotypes are also outlined. Overall, the overlap between anxiety and balance disorders emerges as an important phenomenon in both animal and clinical studies, and may contribute markedly to the complexity of behavioral and physiological phenotypes. Animal experimental models that focus on the interplay between anxiety and vestibular disorders are needed to improve our understanding of this important biomedical problem.