Effects of frequency and length of separation bouts between mother and offspring on later explorative behaviour of young guinea-pigs (Cavia aperea f.porcellus)
Pch. Albers et al., Effects of frequency and length of separation bouts between mother and offspring on later explorative behaviour of young guinea-pigs (Cavia aperea f.porcellus), BEHAVIOUR, 137, 2000, pp. 1487-1502
Previous studies have: shown that maternal behaviour is correlated with lat
er explorative behaviour of the young. Exploring the eventual effects of ma
ternal behaviour on the explorative behaviour of young guinea pigs, we exam
ined the effects of frequency and length of separation bouts between mother
and offspring.
For 39 pups daily duration of contact with the mother was kept constant (17
hours) but the frequency of daily contact (and thus the length of the sepa
ration bouts) varied. Using a split-litter design three groups were created
that were separated from the mother 3, 6 or 9 times each day from day 3 un
til day 20. Several precautions were taken to avoid distress of the pups du
ring separation caused by heat loss, social isolation or unfamiliarity with
the separation cage. The development of the explorative behaviour was asse
ssed by means of a series of tests representing several aspects of explorat
ive behaviour.
All groups showed equal growth Juring the treatment period. It is shown tha
t the group separated 3 times for a long period scored higher in explorativ
e behaviour than the other groups that were separated more often but for sh
orter periods. In particular walking, duration of presence, and sniffing in
the novel environment were increased compared to the groups separated 6 or
9 times but were also increased when compared to average scores of a previ
ous study. It could be shown that individuals were persistent in time with
regard to the maximum distance they entered into a novel environment.