Table 3.
Effects of lesions to the cPAGl,vl (PAG-x) carried out prepartum (gestation day 15–17) or postpartum (day 7) on lactating rat dams’ behavior (means ± SEM) toward a strange male intruder (maternal aggression) in 5 or 10 min tests, respectively
| Prepartum lesion: test day | Postpartum lesion: test day | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | 6 | 5 | 8 | 10 | ||||
| Measure/(F; p) | ||||||||
| Attack frequency | (F = 18.94;p < 0.0003) | (F = 9.2;p < 0.0005) | ||||||
| Sham | 6.5 ± 1.0 | 7.8 ± 0.7 | 14.0 ± 3.0 | 10.3 ± 1.8 | 7.9 ± 1.9 | |||
| PAG-x | 10.9 ± 1.4 | 13.0 ± 1.0 | 12.3 ± 2.3 | 13.8 ± 1.9 | 18.7 ± 1.7 | |||
| Duration (sec) | ||||||||
| Sniff intruder | (F = 0.74; ns) | (F = 0.20; ns) | ||||||
| Sham | 105 ± 9 | 86 ± 8 | 123 ± 16 | 146 ± 15 | 138 ± 14 | |||
| PAG-x | 85 ± 8 | 89 ± 10 | 173 ± 15 | 151 ± 17 | 120 ± 12 | |||
| Aggressive groom | (F = 5.01; p < 0.04) | (F = 8.35; p < 0.001) | ||||||
| Sham | 34 ± 6 | 30 ± 5 | 53 ± 10 | 78 ± 21 | 88 ± 21 | |||
| PAG-x | 21 ± 3 | 18 ± 6 | 96 ± 19 | 39 ± 12 | 48 ± 11 | |||
| Attack bout | (F = 15.12; p < 0.001) | (F = 2.03; ns) | ||||||
| Sham | 3.6 ± 0.6 | 3.1 ± 0.4 | 5.5 ± 0.7 | 5.7 ± 0.7 | 5.0 ± 0.8 | |||
| PAG-x | 5.5 ± 0.5 | 5.7 ± 0.5 | 5.5 ± 0.7 | 6.5 ± 0.7 | 6.7 ± 0.6 | |||
| Sideways posture | (F= 2.14; ns) | |||||||
| Sham | 17 ± 9 | 31 ± 9 | ||||||
| PAG-x | 13 ± 4 | 10 ± 4 | ||||||
| Boxing posture | (F = 3.89; p< 0.10) | |||||||
| Sham | 6 ± 2 | 11 ± 4 | ||||||
| PAG-x | 29 ± 9 | 11 ± 5 | ||||||
Significant effects from ANOVA values based on Group (F(1.19)) in prepartum experiment and Group × Day interaction (F(1,2)) in postpartum experiment, which includes presurgery baseline (day 5);ns, no statistically significant effects.