Why the study?
The study evaluated the influence of sex and age on the expression and habituation of cardiovascular and autonomic responses to restraint stress in rats.
Population
Wistar rats including adult males and females, adolescent males, and aged males
Comparison
Sex (male vs female) and age (adult vs adolescent vs aged) during acute vs 10th restraint session
Follow-up
10th session of restraint
Authors
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Refines rodent stress models by showing comparable acute reactivity; leaves open habituation differences and human translation.
In rats, cardiovascular reactivity to acute stress is sex-independent, but females may have enhanced sympathetic reactivity to repeated stress, while aging limits acute reactivity and adolescence enhances habituation.
Benini et al. (2025) studied this question.