Periadolescent alcohol alters adult behavioral characteristics in the rat.
Long-Evans hooded rats were given 5% alcohol (EtOH), 10% EtOH or tap water as sole fluid from postnatal day 21 (P21) to P70. The 10% EtOH group drank 26% less and 10% EtOH males gained 7.6% less weight than the tap water control group. There were no significant consumption or weight differences between 5% EtOH and control subjects. At P105, 35 days after the conclusion of alcohol dosing, we conducted several behavioral tests. Males in the 10% group drank 67.8% more alcohol than controls in a two-bottle preference test. On a DRL-20-s operant reinforcement schedule, a difficult timing task dependent upon limbic structures, subjects in the 10% group had higher barpress rates, while those in the 5% group had lower barpress rates than controls. On this task, 10% females received fewer reinforcements, while both 5% and 10% males earned more reinforcements than controls. Efficiency ratios were lowest for 10% females and highest for 5% males. Males in the 5% group had shorter latencies than controls to find the platform in a Morris water maze and were significantly more likely than controls to initially find the platform. These data suggest that EtOH consumption during periadolescent development may have long-lasting neurobehavioral effects.
Siciliano
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Department of Psychology, George Mason University, 4400 University Drive, Fairfax, VA 22030, USA.
Smith
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D000367:Age Factors; D000428:Alcohol Drinking / Q000009:adverse effects*; D000818:Animals; D001835:Body Weight / Q000187:drug effects; D001921:Brain / Q000187:drug effects; D004305:Dose-Response Relationship, Drug; D004924:Escape Reaction / Q000187:drug effects; D005260:Female; D008297:Male; D018782:Maze Learning / Q000187:drug effects; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000187:drug effects*; D009042:Motivation; D009949:Orientation / Q000187:drug effects*; D051381:Rats