Fig. 3.

Acute stress causes a delayed increase in anxiety-like behavior of male, but not female, rats. A. Schematic of experimental protocol. Male and female rats were subjected to acute stress and 10 days later, tested for anxiety-like behavior using elevated plus-maze (EPM) test. B. Bar graph showing significant reduction in fraction of time spent in open-arms by stressed male rats (red) compared to control male rats (black), whereas stressed female rats (maroon) do not show any difference compared to control females (grey). Two-way ANOVA, δ denotes p < 0.05 for interaction between stress and gender; Tukey's multiple comparisons, Control Male vs. Stress Male: *p < 0.05. C. No significant effects of stress, gender or their interaction were observed in fraction of total entries into the open-arm. D. Summary graph showing significant increase in Anxiety Indices of stressed male rats compared to control male rats. But no such difference was found in female rats. δ denotes p < 0.05 for interaction between stress and gender; Control Male vs. Stress Male: *p < 0.05. E. Total number of entries into the four arms of EPM are similar between control and stressed males as well as between control and stressed females. However, control females made higher total number of entries than control male rats. ΨΨΨ denotes p < 0.001 for main effect of gender; Control Male vs. Control Female: *p < 0.05, Control Male vs. Stress Female: **p < 0.01. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the Web version of this article.)