An Introduction to Modeling Behavioral Disorders and Stress

Recently, it has been discovered that behavioral conditions such as, depression, anxiety and stress-response have a neurological basis. Understanding the biological underpinnings of these conditions may help scientists in developing more effective therapies to treat these disorders. Typically, rodent models are used in this field and behavioral scientists create these models using interventions like drug administration or surgery. It is important to understand how to create and evaluate rodent models of behavioral disorders as they play an important role in discovery of new treatments for clinical applications.

Here, JoVE science education video first reviews the ‘classical’ criteria used to evaluate rodent models of stress and behavioral disorders. This is followed by some of the important questions that scientists are trying to answer using these models as tools. We’ll also go over several rodent behavioral tests currently being used in this field and discuss applications of these paradigms.