Lieu

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Daniel Lieu
Dr. Haas
Writing 39C
May 6, 2016
Literature Review: Rat Grief
Beginning in the 1950s, scientists have spent countless hours researching and
studying rat cognition and mental ability. Scientists have been asking whether or not rats

Daniel Lieu 5/7/16 2:02 PM

Comment [1]: Good. More specific in
comparison to the previous draft.

experience grief, how the grief functions in animals in comparison to humans, and even
when they grieve. The results and observations in the past hundred years regarding rat
grief will be discussed in this literature review. I will be discussing the earliest study of
rat grief and then leading into what we know now. The research from the three main
scientists, Sharon Ackerman, Hans Selve, and Jakk Pankseep will be discussed because
they were the main driving factors into our current understanding of rat grief. I will then

Daniel Lieu 5/7/16 2:03 PM

Comment [2]: Removed Dr. because
being a scientist implies they are doctorates.

conclude with how what we understand about this topic changes our perception about
how we think about rats.
The Committee for the Study of Health Consequences of Stress and Bereavement
published the first well-known book regarding rat grief on January 1, 1984, titled
Bereavement: Reactions, Consequences, and Care. The committee gathered the findings
of over 100 scientists and brought their summary to the National Academy of Science,
leading to their acknowledgement as one of the first reputable sources in this field.
Sharon Ackerman, a former researcher on protein folding, and current professor at
Wayne State University, led the largest findings in the book when she studied rat reaction
to separation in 1980. Her research group had a control group consisting of a rat and a

Daniel Lieu 5/7/16 2:03 PM

Comment [3]: Simplified. Good.

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newborn infant who were allowed to be together in the same room. Her experimental
group differed in the sense that infants were allowed to be with parents to x amount of
days, and then were separated. The infant rats that were separated from their parents were
observed to suffer from a weakened immune system in comparison to their immune
system before separation, and even appeared to be insomniac with a reduction in REM
(Rapid Eye Movement) cycle when they tried to sleep (Institute of Medicine Committee).
Ackermans understanding of rat behavior through her separation experiment led
to the research groups first conclusion. They concluded that infant rats separated from
their parents underwent grief in a very similar fashion to humans. The science regarding
REM sleep cycle was established in 1952 by a neuroscientist named Eugene Aserinsky
who made this publication in the Journal of Historical Neuroscience, leading to his title
as the pioneer of sleep study (Aserinski, 1). Because this was established before
Ackerman observed the rats, she was able to conclude that rats do in fact undergo a sense
of grief, which was the first actual connection to rats and grief (Institute of Medicine
Committee).
After the observation from Ackerman made the field of rat grief more well
known, Delia Vazquez, a neuroscientist and professor of Pediatrics and Psychiatry at the
Center of Growth and Development discovered the next milestone regarding rat grief.
She isolated rats in a similar fashion to Ackermans experiment in the sense that she
studied what occurred when infant rats were separated from their parents. It differed in
the sense that she studied radioactively labeled adrenocorticotrophin (ACTH), or the
hormone released in the body when experiencing stress (Vazquez 1). Vazquezs science
of this hormone was based off of a previous study on humans by Hans Selye, a doctor

Daniel Lieu 5/7/16 2:05 PM

Comment [4]: Good connection between
a previous scientist and their findings were
utilized.

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and professor at the University of Montreal, Canada. In 1951, he took the mothers of
terminally ill children and observed them from the birth of the child to the death. He
specifically measured the ACTH levels and found that they were only released when the
mother experienced stress, which in comparison to normal mothers without this stress,
was multiplied tenfold (Selye 476).
Vazquez took this understanding and separated the infant rats from their mothers,
measuring their ACTH levels before and after. She found that when the rat was separated,
they went from a normal level of ACTH that gradually increased over time and did not
decrease unless reunited with their mother. Throughout the 10-day experiment involving
200 samples, the prolonged ACTH was similar to the observation from Selye regarding
the mothers who experienced prolonged ACTH levels in comparison to the normal
levels (Vazquez 1). Her discovery led to the conclusion that rats experience stress in the
same fashion as humans at a micro level in addition to a macro level. She published her
findings in the Journal of Neuroendocrinology in 1997, discussing the effects of stress in
rats, explaining that rats undergo the same response when under stress and grieving as
humans do (Vazquez 3).

Daniel Lieu 5/7/16 2:06 PM

Comment [5]: You may want to try and
revise this sentence. It could be written in a
clearer way.

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Figure 1: A measure of ACTH levels in rats separated at 3-4 minutes, and 50-54 minutes. Rats returned to
the mother from 5-50 minutes to establish baseline ACTH levels. (Vazquez 530).

Daniel Lieu 5/7/16 2:06 PM

Comment [6]: Would it be figure 1 or
graph 1? Or does it not matter?

Vazquez summarized her conclusion in the radioactively labeled ACTH test with
the clearest conclusion of raised hormone levels upon separation from the mother. After
gathering the results, it was put into a summarized graph above, labeled Figure 1. During
separation, ACTH levels reached the highest until reunited with the mother, where it then
decreased to normal baseline levels. However, the moment the infant is separated, the
levels increase until reunited again. During the second separation, a longer time period
was given to observe the ACTH levels rise until it was concluded they correlate directly
to the stress and grief of the rat (Vazquez 531).
More recently, a neuroscientist named Jaak Pankseep, the chairman for the
Animal Well-Being Science for the Department of Veterinary and Comparative
Anatomy, Pharmacology, and Physiology at Washington State University published
Affective Neuroscience of the Emotional BrainMind, a journal regarding the brain of
rats in 2010. He specifically studied the effect of hormonal changes in rats during
depression and compared it to humans. In his journal, he noted that depression resulted in
a sustained dysphoria with hormonal change that doesnt decrease to a normal level after
48 hours (Pankseep 1). Rats that were experiencing a decreased amount of activity and
lack of appetite were found to experience an elevated level of hormones in the body, in
comparison to the hormonal levels of that rat from a prior data collection. (Pankseep 2).
Pankseep connected this sustained elevation of hormonal levels and compared it to
humans. During depression, humans experience the same elevated hormone level that rats

Daniel Lieu 5/7/16 2:06 PM

Comment [7]: Nice transition compared
to the previous draft.

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do. As a result, he concluded that rats experienced a similar type of depression to
humans, furthering our understanding of rat grief (Pankseep 1).
The most recent study of rat grief was discovered by a group of scientists at the
University of Sao Paulo in Brazil during their study of pain stimulators in rats. Pain
stimulators are a known cause for grief in humans, leading this research group to study
pain stimulation in rats. Their knowledge was taken from a researcher in 1906 named Dr.
Sherrington who discovered what causes pain in humans noriceptor nerves. From this
discovery, regulations were imposed on humans as test subjects to prevent noriceptor
stimulation (National Research Council). The research group used this knowledge to
perform a test in rats where they stimulated pain through electric shocks specifically on
the noriceptor nerves found in rats, observing their reaction. Through stimulation of this
specific nerve, the rats responded immediately, in comparison to electric stimulation from
nerve endings that arent directly connected to the noriceptors. This discovery in 2013 led
to their publication of Noxious Stimuli in the Neonatal Period in Rats, by The National
Journal of Pain (Sanada S56).
The five large developments regarding rat mourning and their ability to mourn has
led many to begin comparing and contrasting humans to rats beyond physiological
observations. Before the 1900s, many believed rats and humans differed to the furthest
extent based off of physiological observations, especially in the sense that they did not
experience emotions and are autonomous (National Research Council). However, in the
first viral publication, Bereavement: Reactions, Consequences, and Care, the scientific
works of Ackermans research group has led many to believe otherwise. Ackermans
pioneering of the understanding rats do experience grief led many afterwards, like

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Vazquez and Pankseep to build upon our current understanding of rat grief, especially on
a more microbiological level in the ACTH hormone. This understanding contributed to
closing the gap between human and rat grief, leading scientists to conclude that rats do
experience grief.
The developments discussed in this literature review led up to the conclusion that
rats do experience grief, but how does it change the way that scientists are thinking about
using rats as test subjects in the laboratory? The only governing law regarding the use of
animals in research and testing is the Animal Welfare Act (AWA), published in 1966 by
the U.S. Department of Agriculture (www.gpo.gov). Since 1966, there hasnt been a
single change to the AWA, regardless of the fact that a majority of the groundbreaking
discoveries regarding grief in rats were discovered after 1980, beginning with Ackerman,
and not published until 1984.
Rats are very loosely regulated by the AWA in comparison to human test
subjects. Every human that is going to be tested on is subjected to review by the
Institutional Review Board, and even required an obtained consent form (www.hhs.gov).
This was established after the discovery of noriceptor nerves, leading to intense
regulation that these nerves cannot be stimulated during tests in humans (National
Research Council). The recent developments of the similarities of rats to humans, not
only physiologically in anatomy, but also biologically through emotional triggers for
grief should lead to a reconsideration of the Animal Welfare Act published in 1966, prior
to our current understanding of rat grief.
In conclusion, the science regarding rat grief has been continuously and
successfully developing over time. In the past century, weve gone from thinking of rats

Daniel Lieu 5/7/16 2:07 PM

Comment [8]: This conclusion is
dramatically improved compared to the
previous draft. Nice job!

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as autonomous beings who dont feel the same emotion and pain as humans, to
understanding that rats in fact do undergo grief and have very similar microbiological
changes to grief as humans do. As science continues to make strides towards fully
understanding rat grief in comparison to humans, it leads us to really question how we
think about using rats in the laboratory. Our current regulations for human testing is far
more complex and strict in comparison, but as the gap between humans and rats narrows,
its questions whether or not rats should receive the same strict regulations as well. The
science will inevitably develop in rat grief, but whether or not our reassessment of the
AWA will occur due to these developments is the question.

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Bibliography
"Animal Welfare Act." Animal Welfare Act. US. Department of Agriculture. Web. 24
Apr. 2016.
Committee on Recognition and Alleviation of Pain in Laboratory Animals, Institute For
Laboratory Animal
Research, Division on Earth and Life Studies, and
National Research Council. Recognition and Alleviation of Pain in Laboratory
Animals. National Academies, 2009. Print.
"Information on Protection of Human Subjects in Research Funded or Regulated by U.S.
Government." HHS.gov. US Department of Human & Health Services. Web. 24
Apr. 2016.
Panksepp, Jaak. "Affective Reflections and Refractions within the BrainMind." NEJP
Netherlands Journal of Psychology 64.4 (2008): 128-31. Print.
"Research Uses for Rats ." Research Uses for Rats . National Cancer Institute. Web.
24 Apr. 2016.
Sanada, L., K. Sato, E. Carmo, N. Machado, K. Sluka, and V. Fazan. "Noxious Stimuli in
the Neonatal Period in Rats Can Cause Important Peripheral Nervous System
Alterations That Persist on Adults in a Sex-dependent Manner." The Journal of
Pain 14.4 (2013). Web. 24 Apr. 2016.
Selye, Hans. The Physiology and Pathology of Exposure to Stress; a Treatise Based on
the Concepts of the General-adaptation-syndrome and the Diseases of
Adaptation. Montreal: Acta, 1950. Print.
Vzquez, Delia M., Mara I. Morano, and Huda Akil. "Kinetics of Radiolabeled
Adrenocorticotropin Hormone in Infant and Weanling Rats." Journal of
Neuroendocrinology 9.7 (2003): 529-36. Web.

Daniel Lieu 5/7/16 2:08 PM

Comment [9]: Spacing issue.