Developmental NeuroscienceDevelopmental and Educational PsychologyBehavioral NeuroscienceDevelopmental Biology
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Developmental Psychobiology is a peer-reviewed journal that publishes original research papers from the disciplines of psychology, biology, neuroscience, and medicine that contribute to an understanding of behavior development. Research that focuses on development in the embryo/fetus, neonate, juvenile, or adult animal and multidisciplinary research that relates behavioral development to anatomy, physiology, biochemistry, genetics, or evolution is appropriate. The journal represents a broad phylogenetic perspective on behavior development by publishing studies of invertebrates, fish, birds, humans, and other animals. The journal publishes experimental and descriptive studies whether carried out in the laboratory or field. The journal also publishes review articles and theoretical papers that make important conceptual contributions. Special dedicated issues of Developmental Psychobiology , consisting of invited papers on a topic of general interest, may be arranged with the Editor-in-Chief. Developmental Psychobiology also publishes Letters to the Editor, which discuss issues of general interest or material published in the journal. Letters discussing published material may correct errors, provide clarification, or offer a different point of view. Authors should consult the editors on the preparation of these contributions.
Robert L. Schalock, Wendy J. Brown, Ruth Kark, N.K. Menon
AbstractSprague‐Dawley rats were subjected to perinatal (4th gestational day until Postnatal Day 21) methylmercury intoxication to determine the long‐term behavioral effect of the mercury poisoning. Experimental and control animals were evaluated at 110–140 days of age. Compared to controls, the methylmercury animals demonstrated significant behavioral deficits characterized by hypoactivity and by reduced appetitive, escape, and avoidance learning.
James Black, Anita M. Sirevaag, Chris S. Wallace, M H Savin, William T. Greenough
AbstractRats kept in complex environments (EC) show an array of brain changes relative to animals housed individually (IC). These effects have been explained as due to (a) information storage, (b) chronic stress that causes brain damage, or (c) neuroendocrine effects on brain maturation. Complex experience also affects somatic growth and organ development, and these may be related to the EC/IC brain differences. We have compared somatic growth and internal organs of 315 weanling and adult rats with various histories. (a)Young EC rats showed slower skeletal and visceral growth, while many brain components expand. (b) Although thymus and spleen were lighter in young ECs, immunocompetence was nonsignificantly (p<.07) higher than in ICs. (c) Somatic growth of adult rats was slow and not very responsive to experience, whereas studies have shown EC/IC brain effects similar to those in young rats. (d) Males had slightly greater EC/IC somatic and visceral differences. (e) The stress index, adrenal weight, varied across age and experiece, so chronic stress can not explain EC/IC brain differences. Training paradigms show brain changes similar to those from complex experience, occurring specifically with learning and in brain regions using the information. Learning and memory, therefore remain the best explanation of the EC brain effects.
AbstractIn 2 experiments, littermate male gerbils were kept in enriched (EC), standard colony (SC), or impoverished (IC) environments from 30 to 60 days of age. Cerebral effects of these environmental treatments were compared with results obtained previously with laboratory rats and mice. The EC gerbils show, in comparsion with IC, an increase in cortical weight and an increase in the cortical/subcortical weight ratio, a decrease in cortical acetylcholinesterase per unit of weight, and a slight increase in the ratio of cholinesterase to acetylcholinesterase in the cortex. These changes for the most part follow the pattern of EC‐IC effects found in the rat and mouse. In both absolute brain measures and in EC‐IC effects, the gerbil resembles the rat more closely than the mouse. The results extend the generality of findings within Rodentia from the family Muridae, which includes rats and mice, to the family Cricetidae, to which gerbils belong. Furthermore, the gerbil, unlike the laboratory rat and mouse, has not been subjected to many years of selection for laboratory conditions.
AbstractIn previous reports exposure to 80 or 90 days of environmental complexity induced a significant increase in the length of the rat cerebrum, whereas 30 days' exposure induced changes which failed to reach significant levels. In the present study after 30 days of differential rearing, cerebral length was 1.2% (p < .005) greater in brains from the enriched animals; the region contributing to this increase lay between the anterior pole and the point of greatest cerebral width. Measurements of cerebral width and brain weight failed to show any significant change, but the body and adrenal weights of the isolated rats were 19.9% (p ≤ .02) greater, respectively, than those of their littermates reared in environmental complexity. However, the ratios of adrenal weight to body weight did not differ significantly between groups.
Dorothy Einon, Michael Morgan, Barbara J. Sahakian
AbstractMale and female hooded rats were weaned at 17 days and then reared in isolation or in social groups. Intersession habituation of locomotor activity in the open field was tested at 15, 25, and 45 days. Contrary to some previous reports, the 15‐day‐old animals showed significant habituation. At 45 days, however, the isolates showed very little habituation compared to the social animals. The isolates showed a similar pattern of development in their emergence into the open field. Apparently, isolation does not result in an arresting of development, but rather in the formation of behavior patterns otherwise absent in normally reared rats.