The importance of cognitive phenotypes in experimental modeling of animal anxiety and depression

Allan V. Kalueff*, Dennis L. Murphy

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalReview articlepeer-review

57 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Cognitive dysfunctions are commonly seen in many stress-related disorders, including anxiety and depression - the world's most common neuropsychiatric illnesses. Various genetic, pharmacological, and behavioral animal models have long been used to establish animal anxiety-like and depression-like phenotypes, as well as to assess their memory, learning, and other cognitive functions. Mounting clinical and animal evidences strongly supports the notion that disturbed cognitions represent an important pathogenetic factor in anxiety and depression, and may also play a role in integrating the two disorders within a common stress-precipitated developmental pathway. This paper evaluates why and how the assessment of cognitive and emotional domains may improve our understanding of animal behaviors via different high-throughput tests and enable a better translation of animal phenotypes into human brain disorders.

Original languageEnglish
Article number52087
JournalNeural Plasticity
Volume2007
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2007
Externally publishedYes

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