[Abstract Title]. - Society for Neuroscience

Time: Sunday, November 16, 2008, 1:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Program#/Poster#: 297.1/TT19
Topic: F.03.c. Social behavior
Support: NIH grant HD48462
Title: Pair-bond formation alters reward responses
Authors: *J. CURTIS;
Pharmacol & Physiol, Oklahoma State Univ., Tulsa, OK
Abstract: Voles, especially prairie voles, have been used extensively in studies of the neural and
endocrine mechanisms underlying monogamous pair-bonds between adults. Reports from the
past several years suggest that the mesolimbic dopamine system plays an important role in the
formation of monogamous pair-bonds in prairie voles. Further, up-regulation of the D1 family of
dopamine receptors within the nucleus accumbens appears to play an important role in the switch
from sociability to the aversion toward strangers that serves to maintain the monogamous
relationship in prairie voles (Aragona et al, 2006, Nat Neurosci 9:133). Since the mesolimbic
dopamine system also is implicated in reward processing, changes associated with pair bonding
may alter subsequent responses to rewarding stimuli. To test this possibility, we compared
ingestion of a sucrose solution in sexually naïve male prairie voles and in males that were paired
with a female for two weeks. Subjects were paired with sexually naïve, reproductively intact
females between 1700 and 1800h. The following morning, males were separated from their
partners and were presented with a bottle containing a 0.5M sucrose solution for 6h hours,
followed by reunion with the partner. This pattern was repeated on each of the subsequent 12
days but the males received a bottle containing water instead of sucrose. Finally, the sucrose
solution was presented again on the 14th day of cohabitation. Control males received the same
sucrose access pattern, but remained with their respective siblings when not being tested for
ingestion. The amounts of sucrose ingested during each of the sucrose exposures then were
compared. Paired and control males did not differ in the amounts of sucrose ingested during their
respective first exposures, and the amounts of sucrose ingested during the first and second
exposures did not differ for the males that remained with their respective siblings. In contrast,
males that were allowed to pair with a female for two weeks significantly increased their sucrose
intakes from the first and to the second exposures to sucrose. These data suggest that the central
changes associated with the formation of a pair-bond can alter responses to rewarding stimuli.
Disclosures: J. Curtis, None.
Poster
297. Social Recognition and Partner Preference