Fig. 2.

Oxytocin (OXT) decreased anxiety-like behavior in the elevated zero maze, with a suggestion of a larger effect in males. Oxytocin dose-dependently increased open zone occupancy (A, B) and the number of open zone entries (C, D) in male and female mice. The plots show pooled male and female data for open zone occupancy (A) and entries (C) with females represented as ♀ and males as ♂. Separate plots for male and female open zone occupancy (B) and entries (D) are also shown. Two-way ANOVAs were calculated to analyze the male vs. female data. ^#p < 0.05, main effect of sex. The significant main effect of treatment for open zone occupancy and entries was followed by the Holm-Sidak's multiple comparison test. *p < 0.05, difference from vehicle (VEH) in pooled plots. Because the sex × treatment interaction approached significance for open zone occupancy and entries, the Holm-Sidak's multiple comparison test was used to further assess the male and female data separately; ^trp = 0.09, ^☨p < 0.05, difference from VEH in separate plots. See Section 3.1 (Results) for more details.