Defensive burying and stress gastric erosions in alcohol-preferring AA andalcohol-avoiding ANA rats

The aim of this study was to investigate differences in shock-prod induced defensive burying and vulnerability to stress gastric ulcerations in two li nes of rats selectively bred for alcohol-preference (AA) and alcohol-avoida nce (ANA), Alcohol-naive animals from the AA and ANA lines were tested in t he shock-prod defensive burying test and (after an interval of approximatel y 2 months) in a 75 min water-immersion stress ulceration-inducing procedur e, The AA rats showed longer latencies (327.5 s) for burying after shock-pr od compared with the ANA animals (128.0 s), Furthermore, the ANA rats devel oped more stomach ulcerations (12.35 mm) compared with the AA rats (1.30 mm ). Animals also differed based on whether they had been tested for defensiv e burying or not, with the tested animals showing less ulceration developme nt than the control group. We hypothesize that the difference between AA an d ANA rats is controlled by some common biochemical mechanism. One likely c andidate is the dopaminergic system, which is involved in both the motivati onal effects of alcohol, as well as anxiety and stomach ulceration. In addi tion, the alcohol-preferring strain seems to be less fearful and generally may be less sensitive to aversive stimuli, be it shock prod, the aversive p roperties of alcohol, or water immersion stress.