PERINATAL CANNABINOID EXPOSURE MODIFIES THE SOCIOSEXUAL APPROACH BEHAVIOR AND THE MESOLIMBIC DOPAMINERGIC ACTIVITY OF ADULT MALE-RATS

In the present work, we attempted to study whether hashish exposure du ring perinatal development affects sociosexual approach behavior in ad ult rats. To this end, we subjected adult female and male rats that ha d been perinatally exposed to hashish extracts to a sociosexual approa ch behavior test, completed with a dark-light emergence test and with a social interaction test. It was found that adult males perinatally e xposed to hashish extracts exhibited marked changes in the behavioral patterns executed in the sociosexual approach behavior test; these cha nges did not exist in females. Thus, control males first visited the i ncentive male and took longer to visit the incentive female, whereas h ashish-exposed males followed the opposite pattern. Moreover, hashish- exposed males spent more time in the vicinity of the incentive female, whereas they decreased their frequency of visits to, and the time spe nt in, the male incentive area. This behavior was observed early on, d uring the first third of the test, but became normalized and even inve rted later on during the last two-thirds. Additionally, in the social interaction test, the normal reduction in the time spent in active soc ial interaction following the exposure to a neophobic situation (high light levels) in controls did not occur in hashish-exposed males, alth ough these exhibited a response in the dark-light emergence test simil ar to that of their corresponding controls. No changes were seen in sp ontaneous locomotor activity in both tests. These behavioral alteratio ns observed in hashish-exposed males were paralleled by a significant decrease in L-3,4-dihydroxyphenylacetic acid contents in the limbic fo rebrain; this suggests a decreased activity of mesolimbic dopaminergic neurons. No effects were seen in females. Collectively, these results show that in the rat, perinatal cannabinoid exposure affects the soci osexual approach behavior and the mesolimbic dopaminergic activity in adulthood, although the effects were sexually dimorphic because they o nly appeared in the males.