Researchers identify brain pathway impairing postpartum social behavior following adolescent stress
In a Nature Communications study, the University of Alabama at Birmingham researchers used a mouse model and cutting-edge neurobiological techniques to show how psychological stress during adolescence alters neuronal functions in the brain, resulting in altered postpartum social behavior.
This research builds on their recent finding that mice exposed to social isolation in late adolescence, which alone causes no endocrine or behavioral changes, show long-lasting behavioral changes only when accompanied by pregnancy and delivery. They were able to use this behavioral model to probe for postpartum neural circuit differences between mouse dams that were stressed in late adolescence and a control group of mouse dams that remained unstressed in adolescence, due to normal social interactions with other mice.
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