title: Female rats express a conditioned object preference for receipt of sexual stimulation.
abstract: Female rats alternately approach and avoid the male rat during copulation, potentially reflecting appetitive and aversive aspects of mating, respectively. We developed a novel classical conditioning procedure, conditioned object preference (COP), to test whether female rats show increased approach toward a conditioned stimulus associated directly with receipt of sexual stimulation. During conditioning, one scented object was paired with an appetitive stimulus and a different object plus scent was paired with a control stimulus on a separate day. After conditioning, preference for each object was evaluated with a choice task. Experiment 1 was conducted to verify the procedure. Rats exhibited a significant COP for 1mg/kg amphetamine, indicating that the conditioned object preference procedure is an effective tool for evaluating the rewarding nature of a treatment. In Experiment 2, paced mating to one ejaculation and experimenter-delivered artificial vaginocervical stimulation (aVCS) each induced a COP. The robust COPs for paced mating and aVCS support the notion that female rats experience a reward state during receipt of sexual stimulation. Moreover, the data suggest that any aversive aspects of receipt of sexual stimulation do not overshadow the appetitive effects.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Carleton College, Northfield, MN, 55057, United States.
authors.forename: Sophie A
authors.initials: SA
authors.lastname: Guterl
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Carleton College, Northfield, MN, 55057, United States.
authors.forename: Tanner A
authors.initials: TA
authors.lastname: McNamara
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Carleton College, Northfield, MN, 55057, United States.
authors.forename: Gracie C
authors.initials: GC
authors.lastname: Klumpp
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Carleton College, Northfield, MN, 55057, United States. Electronic address: smeerts@carleton.edu.
authors.forename: Sarah H
authors.initials: SH
authors.lastname: Meerts
mesh_terms: D000661:Amphetamine / Q000494:pharmacology; D000818:Animals; D000697:Central Nervous System Stimulants / Q000494:pharmacology; D002755:Choice Behavior / Q000187:drug effects / Q000502:physiology*; D003214:Conditioning, Classical / Q000187:drug effects; D003213:Conditioning, Psychological / Q000187:drug effects / Q000502:physiology*; D003270:Contraceptive Agents / Q000494:pharmacology; D004958:Estradiol / Q000031:analogs & derivatives / Q000494:pharmacology; D005260:Female; D008297:Male; D051381:Rats; D020318:Rats, Long-Evans; D012201:Reward; D012726:Sexual Behavior, Animal / Q000187:drug effects / Q000502:physiology*; D013997:Time Factors; D014621:Vagina / Q000294:innervation
chemical_list: D000697:Central Nervous System Stimulants; D003270:Contraceptive Agents; C074283:estradiol 3-benzoate; D004958:Estradiol; D000661:Amphetamine
keywords: Conditioned place preference; Paced mating behavior; Pacing; Reward; Sexual contact