Helping behavior in prairie voles: A model of empathy and the importance of oxytocin

Kitano, Kota; Yamagishi, Atsuhito; Horie, Katsutoshi; Nishimori, Katsuhiko; Sato, Nobuya

doi:10.1016/j.isci.2022.103991

Cited by 15 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 85 publications

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“… 64 Similarly, in prairie voles, KO of the Oxtr resulted in decreased helping behavior when observing distressed conspecifics. 65 Collectively, our behavioral data present a nuanced montage of the neurodevelopmental effects of labor induction with Oxt for the offspring and identify derangement of empathy-like behavior in male offspring as a likely consequence.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 80%

Oxytocin-induced birth causes sex-specific behavioral and brain connectivity changes in developing rat offspring

Giri,

Maloney,

Giri

et al. 2024

iScience

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 80%

Oxytocin-induced birth causes sex-specific behavioral and brain connectivity changes in developing rat offspring

Giri,

Maloney,

Giri

et al. 2024

iScience

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“…Mutant mothers were also able to transfer some milk to suckling infants, resulting in the survival of approximately half the litter, although their mean body weight was significantly reduced. Oxytocin receptor KO prairie voles were also created independently and it was reported that they exhibited reduced preference for social novelty and learning of peer‐helping behavior and increased repetitive behaviors 49,50 . Maternal/allomaternal behaviors are yet to be explored.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Oxytocin receptor KO prairie voles were also created independently and it was reported that they exhibited reduced preference for social novelty and learning of peer-helping behavior and increased repetitive behaviors. 49,50 Maternal/ allomaternal behaviors are yet to be explored. Therefore, the lack of abnormal phenotypes in oxytocin-KO prairie vole mothers cannot be attributed to inbreeding, nor spontaneous allomaternal motivation.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of oxytocin ablation on pup rescue, nursing behaviors and response to pup separation in early‐to‐mid postpartum mice

Ohmura

Miyazawa

et al. 2023

J Neuroendocrinology

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Oxytocin, a neuropeptide hormone, is indispensable for milk ejection during nursing and is important for uterine contractions during parturition. The exact functions of oxytocin in postpartum maternal behaviors and motivations require further investigation. To this end, we characterized the role of oxytocin in components of maternal motivations during the mid‐postpartum period, which has not been previously studied. To maintain suckling stimuli, postpartum oxytocin knockout (Oxt−/−) and heterozygous (Oxt+/−) littermates were co‐housed with a wild‐type lactating mother and its litter, and were examined for their ability to retrieve pups under standard or high‐risk conditions, nursing behavior, maternal aggression towards an unfamiliar intruder, and motivation to regain contact with separated pups. One‐third of Oxt−/− mothers exhibited prolonged parturition but were otherwise grossly healthy. Despite their inability to eject milk, Oxt−/− mothers displayed nursing behaviors for similar durations to Oxt+/− mothers during the second postpartum week. In addition, Oxt−/− mothers were essentially intact for pup retrieval under standard conditions and were motivated to stay close to pups, although they showed a mild decrease in maternal care under high‐risk conditions and increased anxiety‐like behaviors in pup‐related contexts. The present findings indicate that oxytocin is dispensable for nursing behavior and maternal motivations, yet suggest that oxytocin may be relevant for stress resilience in the postpartum period.

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“…The experiment of Sato et al (2015) also supported this result. Similarly, Kitano et al (2022) has recently shown that prairie voles would help to rescue their conspecifics from soaking in water. When their conspecifics were not soaking in water, prairie voles’ door opening behavior were inhibited.…”

Section: Why Help Others: Concern For Othersmentioning

confidence: 95%

Why help others? Insights from rodent to human early childhood research

Chen

Han²,

Yin³

2023

Front. Behav. Neurosci.

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Helping behavior are actions aiming at assisting another individual in need or to relieve their distress. The occurrence of this behavior not only depends on automated physiological mechanisms, such as imitation or emotional contagion, that is, the individual’s emotion and physiological state matching with others, but also needs motivation to sustain. From a comparative and developmental perspective, we discover that the motivation for helping behavior has a deep foundation both phylogenetically and ontogenetically. For example, empathic concern for others, relieving personal distress and the desire for social contact are universal motivations across rodents, non-human primates and human early childhoods. Therefore, a circle-layered model integrating evidences for motivation for helping behavior from rodent to human early childhood research is proposed: the inner circle contains the emotional-behavioral system and the outer circle contains the affective-cognitive system. The application of this model has significance for both behavioral neuroscience research and cultivating prosocial behavior in human society.

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Helping behavior in prairie voles: A model of empathy and the importance of oxytocin

Cited by 15 publications

References 85 publications

Oxytocin-induced birth causes sex-specific behavioral and brain connectivity changes in developing rat offspring

Oxytocin-induced birth causes sex-specific behavioral and brain connectivity changes in developing rat offspring

Effects of oxytocin ablation on pup rescue, nursing behaviors and response to pup separation in early‐to‐mid postpartum mice

Why help others? Insights from rodent to human early childhood research

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