SOCIAL FACILITATION OF LOCOMOTION AND EXPLORATION IN RATS

Abstract

Male white rats engaged in more locomotion and less defaecation and freezing in an open field when in the company of another male rat than when alone. They also exhibited proportionally more sniffling and less tooth grinding and chattering when in the same square of the aparatus as their partners than when in different squares. It was concluded that the presence of a second rat somehow reduced the aversive nature of the experimental environment.