Sex differences in spatial and non-spatial Y-maze performance after chronic stress
Abstract
Chronic restraint is known to alter hippocampal CA3 dendritic morphology and spatial memory in male rats. The present study examined whether female rats, which exhibit different anatomical adaptations to chronic stress than those of males, would also show spatial memory impairments. Male and female Sprague-Dawley rats were restrained for 6 h/day for 21 days, a time frame previously demonstrated to cause hippocampal CA3 dendritic atrophy. The day after the last restraint session, rats were tested on a Y-maze, a habituation task that can be used to assess spatial memory. Chronic stress impaired Y-maze performance in both sexes without affecting levels of locomotion as measured by total arm entries in the first minute. However, Y-maze performance of stressed females improved in 2-5 min when chronically stressed males continued to show poor Y-maze performance. The enhanced Y-maze performance of chronically stressed females occurred when total arm entries were higher compared to the entries made by males. Therefore, correlations were performed between total arm entries and spatial memory in 1 and 2-5 min. In the first minute when control females demonstrated functional spatial memory, female controls with the lowest locomotor levels exhibited the best performance. The correlations for stressed females were not significant, and neither were the correlations for any group in 2-5 min. Overall, these results show important sex differences in response to chronic stress with females exhibiting an ability to recover quickly from deficits in Y-maze performance.
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Stress enhances performance of female rodents on the radial arm maze, Morris water maze, Y-maze, non-associative learning, and object placement tasks, whereas stress impairs male performance in these assays.
“Stress enhances the performance of female rodents on the radial arm maze, Morris water maze, Y–maze, non–associative learning, and object placement tasks, whereas stress impairs male performance in these assays86–88.”
From Neurobiology of resilience (2012) · cites this paper as [86]
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- Authors
- Conrad, C. D., Grote, K. A., Hobbs, R. J., & Ferayorni, A.
- Affiliations
- Arizona State University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Conrad, Cheryl D
- Venue
- Neurobiology of Learning and Memory
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2003-01
- Volume
- 79
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 32-40
- ISSN
- 1074-7427 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2092919706
- Cited by
- 215
- References
- 64
- Citations by year
- 2026: 5 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 4 · 2023: 5 · 2022: 9 · 2021: 8 · 2020: 11 · 2019: 7 · 2018: 8 · 2017: 4 · 2016: 14 · 2015: 6 · 2014: 14 · 2013: 20 · 2012: 9
- FWCI
- 2.65
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Neurobiology of Learning and Memory (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institute of Mental Health (MH64727, R01MH064727)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Behavioral Neuroscience › Stress Responses and Cortisol
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Memory and Neural Mechanisms
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neuroscience and Neuropharmacology Research
- Keywords
- sex differences, chronic restraint stress, spatial memory, Y-maze, hippocampal CA3, dendritic atrophy, locomotor activity, stress recovery, female rats
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Behavior, Animal, Chronic Disease, Female, Male, Memory, Sex Factors, Spatial Behavior, Stress, Physiological, Time Factors, Rats, Sprague-Dawley, Maze Learning, Rats
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