Lean and mean rats

In experiment 1, individually housed rats subjected to short-term food restriction displayed more territorial aggression toward conspecific intruders than controls maintained on a free-feeding diet. In experiment 2, small groups of three adult male rats had access to either a standard laboratory diet or the standard diet plus sucrose. Groups with the sucrose supplement were significantly less aggressive toward intruders than controls. Sucrose availability did not produce appreciable gains in body weight but it did reliably decrease within-colony weight variation. The results suggest the existence of an effective dietary mechanism that enables a social species such as Rattus norvegicus to tolerate each other in dense feeding aggregations when food is abundant. Conversely, when food is limited, social intolerance increases and serves to limit the development of large feeding groups.

Aggression · Animal science · Biology · Body weight · Developmental psychology · Feeding behavior · Food intake · Starvation · Sucrose · Animal Behavior and Reproduction · Animal Ecology and Behavior Studies · Endocrinology · Food Science · Plant and animal studies · Psychology

• Organization of sex-typical patterns of defense during food protection in the rat

  Open Access•Evelyn F Field, Ian Q Whishaw et al.•Aggressive Behavior•1997

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• Jolly fat rats? The effects of diet-induced obesity on territorial fighting

  Open Access•Lori A Schultz, Lori Schultz et al.•Aggressive Behavior•1987

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• Colony aggression in laboratory rats

  Open Access•Richard Lore, Michael Nikoletseas et al.•Aggressive Behavior•1984

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