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PubMed1997

Emerging themes in preclinical research on alcohol and aggression.

Animal research into the alcohol-aggression relationship is based on a need to understand this relationship in people, and its success depends on the degree to which animal models can provide appropriate parallels to relevant human phenomena. Comparisons of human and animal literature suggest that parallels may be found for the following: alcohol enhances aggression in some, but not all individuals; consumption increases the probability of victimization (being attacked by a conspecific); alcohol reduces anxiety, and socially stressed individuals show increased voluntary consumption; alcohol reduces avoidance of threatening situations or stimuli and may place individuals at greater risk of being attacked; both anxiety reduction and decreased avoidance of threat may increase the probability of involvement in violent situations. These findings suggest that a variety of mechanisms may be involved in alcohol enhancement of aggression. Differences in effects of alcohol on human, as opposed to animal, aggression may reflect specific human capabilities. Although high doses of alcohol consistently reduce aggression in laboratory animals, this may reflect motoric and sedative effects that are not relevant for human behavior, in which verbal aggression and aggression involving the use of weapons make motor capability less important. Human voluntary alcohol consumption may also reflect response to stressors that also simultaneously promote aggression, a situation not paralleled by animal studies in which the drug is administered rather than voluntarily consumed. Nonetheless, obtained parallels suggest that animal experimentation using ecologically relevant situations can provide highly generalizable analyses of the alcohol-aggression relationship.

Aggression↗
PubMed2000

Pituitary-adrenocortical responses to the first dyadic encounters in male rhesus monkeys: effect of dominance relationship.

Male rhesus monkeys unfamiliar with each other were paired in a cage, and blood samples were collected before and a few hours after pair formation. Adrenocorticotrophic hormone (ACTH) and cortisol levels in each blood sample were measured. Dominant-subordinate status was ascertained through two rank tests, the food competition test and the agonistic behavior test, which were performed immediately after pair formation. As a result, the dominance relationship was determined in seven pairs formed from five animals, and the differences in ACTH and cortisol values between the dominant and subordinate animal in these pairs were compared statistically. The day after the first encounter, a second encounter was conducted in randomly selected pairs of monkeys. In the first encounters, higher levels of both ACTH and cortisol were detected in dominant animals in comparison to subordinate animals. Changing the animal's partner altered the stress responses whenever the animal's dominant-subordinate status changed. The elevated levels of ACTH and cortisol in dominant animals disappeared on the day after the first encounter. In dominant animals, the pituitary-adrenocortical stress response reacts sharply to situational demands, whereas subordinate animals have a weaker response. This acute stress response is different from a chronic stress response. When the subordinate animal cannot escape, its hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical axis appears to be suppressed.

Adrenocorticotropic Hormone↗
PubMed1980

Interventions and the development of dominance relationships in female baboons.

Dominance relationships between adult and adolescent female yellow baboons, Papio cynocephalus, were studied in Amboseli Park, Kenya. Adolescents attempted to become dominant to some females (called 'targeted females') while remaining subordinate to others. Agonistic relationship with targeted females passed through a sequence of stages before the younger female achieved dominance. An examination of nondyadic agonistic interactions revealed that adolescents frequently intervened against targeted females, but never against nontargeted females, and that others sometimes aided adolescents against targeted females, but aided nontargeted females against adolescents. Interveners were unrelated adult females and other adolescents as well as kin. Targeting was determined by birth rank (the rank of the adolescent's mother at the time of the adolescent's birth) and did not depend on interventions by the mother.

Age Factors↗
PubMed1990

Psychosocial stress affects pineal function in the tree shrew (Tupaia belangeri).

Using a recently developed commercially available radioimmunoassay the concentration of the principal melatonin metabolite 6-sulfatoxymelatonin (aMT6s) in the morning urine of male tree shrews was determined. Chronic social confrontation elicited a drastic increase of aMT6s excretion in subordinate tree shrews, whereas there was a tendency to reduced excretion of the melatonin metabolite in dominant animals. These results substantiate the function of the pineal gland in transforming stimuli from the social environment to endocrine information and, therefore, are indicative for the relevant role the gland may play in the physiological reactions to chronic psychosocial stress.

Agonistic Behavior↗
PubMed2005

Neural responses to aggressive challenge correlate with behavior in nonbreeding sparrows.

The present study was conducted on captive male song sparrows (Melospiza melodia) during the nonbreeding season in order to (1) examine Fos and Zenk responses of basal forebrain sites to simulated territorial intrusion and (2) determine how those responses relate to aggression. Numerous forebrain areas showed significant Fos and Zenk responses to simulated territorial intrusion, and in several areas of the hypothalamus and lateral septum, these responses were negatively correlated with aggressive behavior. Homologous areas in mammals show greater responses in subordinate subjects than in dominant subjects. Thus, these brain areas may be responsive to social stressors across a wide range of vertebrates.

Aggression↗
PubMed1989

Antipredator defensive behaviors in a visible burrow system.

Analyzed defensive behaviors in a seminatural setting through videorecordings of groups of 4 male and 4 female rats. Before cat exposure dominant males showed more offensive behavior, eating, drinking, and use of the open area than subordinates. Presentation of a cat in the open area produced changes in four subpatterns of defense over a 24-hr period: withdrawal; immobility and movement constraint; risk assessment; and suppression of nondefensive behaviors. All Ss showed pronounced and consistent changes in each of these patterns, but dominant males alone showed increased risk assessment-related corner runs. These results provide an extensive description of rat defensive behaviors in a seminatural and relatively unstructured situation and suggest that the anxiety process is initially associated with withdrawal and movement arrest, giving way to a crucial and long-lasting risk-assessment stage that provides information leading to either further defensiveness or a return to nondefensive behaviors. This analysis suggests new models for the study of anxiety.

Animals↗
PubMed2003

Concerning the Madrid Lecture: the equivocal character of Pavlov's reflexological objectivism and its influence on the distorted concept of the physiology-psychology relationship.

The aim of this study is to bring to light and make clear the characteristic equivoque Pavlov made when he conceived the neurophysiological circuit involved in conditioned behavior as if this circuit contained or reduced, in its own terms, such behavior. I also wish to point out how this interpretation implies a distorted concept of the relationships between neurophysiology and behavior. As an alternative, it is proposed that behavior, which is always operant behavior, is not at all reducible to its neurophysiological ingredients, but instead acts like an arrow-head for adaptation that, in turn, confers a subordinate function to the neurophysiological ingredients involved. To make this evident, behavior is considered an operant organic activity that takes place in an environment of "remote co-present" texture, and different from its neurophysiological ingredients, which take place within the context of spatial contiguity relationships.

Animals↗
PubMed1991

Group formation of previously single-caged adult rhesus macaques for the purpose of environmental enrichment.

An attempt was made to form two groups of 6 previously single-caged adult female and 6 previously single-caged adult male rhesus macaques. The study was based on the premise that simultaneous introduction of familiar animals reduces the risks involved during group formation. Future group members were therefore given ample opportunity to physically interact with each other on a one-to-one basis and were considered ready for group formation only when they had demonstrated compatibility and clear-cut dominance-subordination relationships. Both group formation attempts were failures. Aggressive incompatibility was heralded by certain subjects challenging other partners to whom they had originally been subordinate. Aggressive harassment was intensive and persistent. Victims showed no resistance except for fear-grinning and crouching in submission. They did so to no avail. Both groups were split again within the first hour of introduction to avoid fatal consequences. It was concluded, that unlike pair-housing, group-housing of previously single caged adult rhesus macaques is associated with considerable risks which cannot be overcome by systematically familiarizing all group members before the animals are introduced as a group. There is no guarantee that well established dyadic relationships do not break down within the more complex social structure of the group, thereby triggering aggressive conflicts that put the animals' safety into undue jeopardy.

Aggression↗
PubMed2006

Prehibernating aggregations of Polistes dominulus: an occasion to study early dominance assessment in social insects.

At a very early age several mammals establish a first dominance hierarchy, which often persists into adulthood. Social wasps offer an excellent opportunity to study such a phenomenon in insects. Indeed, foundresses of several paper wasps meet in clusters to hibernate from September to March. In spring, wasps found new associative nests where linear hierarchies occur. In the first phase of hibernation, clustering Polistes dominulus wasps show most of the social interactions occurring on the nest 6 months later. At the emergence from diapause, some females already show some behavioral and physiological traits typical of dominant individuals. Here, we investigated the significance of the interactions in the autumnal clusters. We demonstrated that in a given pair, it is more likely that the dominant wasp in autumn becomes the alpha female in spring after the nest foundation phase occurred. Moreover, we showed that dominant females in clusters have both larger body size and ovaries. As ovarian development mainly depends on the social context, our findings seem to indicate that social factors affect the tendency to dominate in aggregations. Furthermore, we suggest that some females may reinforce their physiological status by dominating in clusters, thus increasing the probability to become dominant in spring.

Aggression↗
PubMed2006

I get by with a little help from my friends: the interaction of chronic pain and organizational support on performance.

The authors conducted three studies to examine the interactive effects of perceived organizational support (POS) and chronic pain on performance outcomes (i.e., effectiveness, work intensity, citizenship behavior, and task performance). After controlling for demographic factors, tenure variables, the number of subordinates, and main effects, the POS chronic pain interaction explained criterion variance for perceived effectiveness and citizenship behavior in Study 1; effectiveness, work intensity, and citizenship behavior in Study 2; and supervisor-rated task performance in Study 3. Higher levels of chronic pain were associated with lower levels of performance when coupled with low support, as hypothesized. Conversely, high levels of POS reduced the adverse effects of chronic pain on performance. Contributions, strengths and limitations, and future research directions are provided.

Adult↗
PubMed1995

Behavioral and hormonal changes in female naked mole-rats (Heterocephalus glaber) following removal of the breeding female from a colony.

Colonies of naked mole-rats (Heterocephalus glaber) contain a single dominant, breeding female, or "queen", which suppresses reproduction in subordinate females. In this study, the queen and breeding male were removed from a colony at Brookfield Zoo. We examined behavioral and endocrine changes in the remaining colony females. Behavioral observations were conducted weekly and urine samples were collected beginning 3 months prior to the planned removal of animals. Prior to the removal, only the queen displayed the high frequencies of aggressive shoving typical of breeding females. In the first 2 months following removal of the queen, three non-breeding females markedly increased their frequencies of shoving. Urinary progesterone showed that one of three females had probably ovulated both before and after queen removal. Histological examination following fatal agonistic interactions confirmed ovulatory function in two of these three females. Similar behavioral and endocrinological results were obtained for three more females, following the combat deaths of the first three females. These findings suggest that ovarian activation facilitates intrasexual aggression in female naked mole-rats and might contribute to attainment of breeding status.

Aggression↗
PubMed1980

Type A coronary-prone behavior and stress in senior female managers and administrators.

This article describes a study of relationships between Type A coronary-prone behavior patterns, as measured by the Bortner and Rosenman scale, and stress levels, coping ability and psychological stress-related symptoms of a group of 148 senior female managers and administrators. The results indicate that the majority of the sample were categorized as Type A individuals, and that Type A behavior was related to age. A relationship was found between Type A behavior and subjects perceiving themselves as having higher stress levels compared to the female and male peers with whom they worked. Type A individuals perceived that their "ability to cope with stress" was worse compared to that of their female peers and female superiors, but saw themselves as better "copers" compared to their female subordinates. Type A individuals did not see themselves as a source of stress to their subordinates. A relationship was also found between Type A behavior and symptoms of anxiety, frustration and irritation. Results are compared to those of previous relevant research, and the implications of the findings are discussed.

Adult↗
PubMed1978

Problems with using dominance indices to evaluate family interaction patterns.

Used four well-accepted behavioral measures of dominance to document changes in dominant/submissive behaviors of marital couples as a result of videotape feedback of behavior in decision-making tasks. Dominance scores for 30 normal couples on each of the four indices were correlated, and results indicated that the measures bore little relationship to each other. Further, a review of videotaped interactions revealed little to warrant even intuitive support for three of the measures. Such data support the contention that these popular indices may be inappropriate to assess dominance across couples.

Behavior Therapy↗
PubMed2000

Distinguishing kinds of prior dominance and subordination experiences in males of green swordtail fish (Xiphophorus helleri).

In experiments, there are usually two general ways of obtaining dominants and subordinates to test for the effect of recent experience upon ulterior behavior and dominance. One is to 'impose' such an experience on the contestants by a priori deciding which individual of the pair will become the dominant and which will become the subordinate through the use of rigged contests. The second technique is to let contestants 'self-select' the winner and loser by waiting for the spontaneous outcome of dyadic encounters between two usually well matched opponents. These two techniques of obtaining dominants and subordinates probably represent extreme cases on a single continuum of investment made by animals to settle dominance. To test this, we compared dominants and subordinates obtained from these two techniques in Xiphophorus fish males. It was found that pairs obtained through rigged contest (R) were much more aggressive in subsequent encounters than pairs in which the dominant and subordinate could self-select (S). They recuperated more rapidly from handling, initiated contact earlier, took more time to assess each other, and fought for a longer period of time. Prior-winners and prior-losers of the R condition more frequently relied on aggressive behavior during contest than that of the S condition. As a consequence, prior-winners and prior-losers of the R condition won equally the subsequent contest. On the contrary, prior-winners of the S condition defeated their prior-loser opponent in a majority of cases. These results can be tentatively explained by the following principle, winning or losing against a well matched opponent would leave more 'experience' than winning over a much weaker opponent, or losing to a much stronger one. This reinforces the hypothesis that prior-experiences are not qualitative states but come in various degrees.

Journal Article↗
PubMed2000

Heart rate within male crayfish: social interactions and effects of 5-HT.

Behaviors, such as those that establish dominant and subordinate social status, are thought to be driven by various neuromodulators and hormones. In crustaceans, the level of serotonin (5-HT) in the hemolymph is correlated with degree of aggressiveness. The crustacean heart is neurogenic and is modulated by neural secretion of 5-HT in the hemolymph, which bathes the cardiac tissue. We discuss and present the results of measuring heart rate (HR) of crayfish during interactions, as an indication of their state of excitability. HR is the result of multiple influences: a cocktail of hormones and modulators. HR was monitored during the periods in which crayfish established aggressive and submissive social status, during sham injections, and following injections of various doses of 5-HT. Crayfish, during an interaction to establish social status, can increase HR. Both the aggressive and submissive crayfish can dampen their HR within seconds during a pause in the interaction, while still posturing in an aggressive or submissive state. Injections of 5-HT to obtain systemic levels of approximately 100 nM-10 microM increase HR substantially for hours. This suggests that aggressive interactions and the establishment of a dominant posture may not be related to large increases in the free concentrations of 5-HT within the circulating hemolymph, since a sustained HR is not observed in aggressive animals. Instead, the results may demonstrate that inhibitory cardiac regulation is present in the aggressors during interactions and that a regulator is possibly 5-HT.

Animals↗
PubMed2002

Effects of long-term moderate alcohol consumption on agonistic and affiliative behavior of socially housed female cynomolgus monkeys (Macaca fascicularis).

RATIONALE: The most widely used drug in the US is alcohol. Most people who use alcohol are light-to-moderate drinkers. One or two drinks/day is thought to be not only safe but potentially health-promoting. However, little is known about the chronic effects of moderate alcohol consumption. Alcohol, even in moderate doses, has immediate and robust effects on behavior. OBJECTIVE: To determine the effects of long-term moderate alcohol consumption on the social interactions of adult monkeys. METHODS: Forty-nine adult, ovariectomized monkeys lived in small, stable social groups for 31 months and voluntarily consumed a 2-drink/day equivalent (0.5 g/kg ethanol), 5 days/week for 24 months. Alcohol was presented in a sweet tasting non-nutritive vehicle to half the monkeys, while the other half received vehicle plus maltose-dextrin isocalorically substituted for alcohol. Social behavior was recorded 1 h before, 1 h after, and 5 h after alcohol. RESULTS: Alcohol caused chronic changes in aggressive and affiliative behavior that were not dependent upon the presence of circulating alcohol. Alcohol increased physical aggression. A subset of the animals was at higher risk for alcohol-induced physical aggression. Alcohol decreased positive affiliative behaviors, increased time spent alone, and increased the frequency of extragroup vigilance. Acutely, alcohol increased the rate of behavioral pathology, i.e. stereotypic behaviors, such as hair plucking, which are normally observed only under adverse environmental conditions. CONCLUSIONS: Long-term moderate alcohol consumption caused chronic deleterious changes in the social interactions of primates in small, stable social groups. These data suggest that chronic moderate alcohol consumption can compromise optimal social interactions in primate species, including human beings.

Aggression↗