Influences of paternal and maternal care on offspring social cognition

描述（由申请人提供）：本研究项目的长期目标是了解双亲本哺乳动物的幼年亲缘经历对社会行为的影响。我们将研究“破碎家庭”对神经生物学和行为的发育后果，在这些家庭中，父亲缺席，或者母亲牺牲了对后代食物获取的照顾。亲子互动为年轻人的成长提供了主要的社会经验，并可能对塑造社会决策产生终生的影响。人类是双亲。不幸的是，我们对行为发展的大部分了解都来自于那些社会组织与我们截然不同的物种。荷尔蒙催产素（OT）和抗利尿激素（VP）与社会行为的控制有着千丝万缕的联系，尤其是它们对亲代照顾和亲缘关系的影响。我们最近的工作表明，父亲影响后代成年后的社会互动，出生后的环境塑造了发育中的大脑中OT和VP受体的表达。因此，社会行为的个体发生变化可能植根于社会大脑的同步变化。我们的假设是：操纵双亲抚育会产生具有不同社会和认知能力的后代，这将与催产素和抗利尿激素基因表达的生理差异有关。关于草原田鼠社会行为（包括双亲抚育）和神经生物学（特别是OT和VP系统）的大量知识使这些社会一夫一妻制动物成为检验这一假设的特殊模型。我们的一般方法是确定出生后环境中照顾者的存在或缺失是否会影响认知发展或社会行为，并确定OT或VP的发展差异是否与行为结果相关。在目标1中，我们将通过减少父亲的照顾（去除父亲）或增加母亲的照顾（诱导舔/梳理）来对比父亲和母亲的照顾，以确定断奶前社会经验的后果。我们将确定父亲对后代发展的重要性，以及母亲是否弥补了父亲的缺失。在目标2中，我们将调查“单身职业母亲”对后代的影响。通过增加获得食物的难度，母亲将面临内在的权衡，是为食物而工作还是照顾后代。在这两个目标中，我们将评估后代的社会焦虑、社会认知、探索、攻击和社会偏好，我们将表征OT、VP及其受体的表达。这些研究将提供一个更清晰的画面双亲照顾的重要性。该提案显著推进了NIH追求“生命系统行为的基本知识”的使命，旨在改善人类发展过程中的心理健康和健康。这项工作将揭示许多潜在的产后发育的神经生物学，并可能促进对调节人类社会行为和功能障碍的机制的更深层次的理解。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The long-term goal of this research program is to understand the impact of early-life affiliative experiences on social behavior in a bi-parental mammal. We will examine the developmental consequences on neurobiology and behavior resulting from 'broken homes' in which fathers are absent, or mothers compromise offspring care for food acquisition. Parent-offspring interactions provide the principle social experiences for developing young, and may have life-long ramifications that shape social decisions. Humans are bi-parental. Unfortunately, most of what we know about behavioral development comes from species whose social organization differs significantly from our own. The hormones oxytocin (OT) and vasopressin (VP) are inextricably linked with the control of social behavior and are particularly well known for their influences on parental care and affiliation. Our recent work has demonstrated that fathers impact offspring adult social interactions, and the postnatal environment shapes OT and VP receptor expression in the developing brain. Thus, the ontogenetic changes in social behavior are probably rooted in concurrent changes in the social brain. Our hypothesis is: manipulating bi-parental care will produce offspring with varied social and cognitive ability, which will relate to physiological differences in oxytocinergic and vasopressinergic gene expression. The substantial knowledge about prairie vole social behavior (including bi-parental care) and neurobiology (OT and VP systems in particular) makes these socially monogamous animals an exceptional model to test this hypothesis. Our general approach is to determine if the presence or absence of caregivers in the postnatal environment influences cognitive development or social behavior, and determine if developmental differences in OT or VP relate to behavioral outcomes. In Aim 1, we will contrast paternal and maternal care to identify consequences of pre-wean social experience, by either reducing paternal care (removing fathers) or increasing maternal care (inducing licking / grooming). We will determine the importance of fathers on offspring development and if mothers compensate for absent fathers. In Aim 2, we will investigate the influence of 'single working moms' on offspring. By increasing the difficulty for access to food, mothers will be faced with the inherent trade-off between working for food or caring for offspring. In both aims, we will evaluate offspring social anxiety, social cognition, exploration, aggression, and social preferences, and we will characterize the expression of OT, VP and their receptors. These studies will provide a clearer picture of the importance of bi-parental care. This proposal significantly advances the NIH mission to pursue 'fundamental knowledge about the behavior of living systems' and is designed to improve both mental health and health in the process of human development. This work will reveal much of the neurobiology that underlies postnatal development, and could foster a deeper understanding of mechanisms regulating human social behavior and dysfunction.