Table 1.

Comparison of human anxiety disorders to anxiety-like behavior in mice

Disorder	Human symptoms	Observed behavior in mice	Behavioral test in mice
Generalized anxiety disorder	Excessive worry about everyday life, leading to difficulties in concentration	Decreased social interaction, impaired sustained attention	OF, L/D, Y-maze
Posttraumatic stress disorder	Repeated re-experiencing traumatic events, leading to avoidance of stimuli associated with trauma	Increased freezing response to fear conditioning, decreased fear extinction, more pronounced spontaneous recovery	Cue and contextual fear conditioning, fear extinction
Obsessive-compulsive disorder	Intrusive thoughts that produce repetitive behavior aimed at reducing anxiety	Increased marble burying and excessive grooming	Burrowing test, nest construction test
Social phobia	avoidance of social contact, emotional discomfort caused by presence of unknown people	Low social interaction	Three-chamber test of sociability, social recognition test
Panic disorder	Intense fearfulness of sudden onset, respiratory distress	Increased escape from an aggressor	Resident intruder test
Agoraphobia	Avoidance of wide-open or crowded space	Avoidance of exposed, bright areas	OF, L/D

Anxiety disorders are classified according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders of American Psychiatric Association (DSM-IV). OF, Open field test; L/D, Light/dark box test. Modified from [11].