SOCIAL-DOMINANCE AND STRESS-INDUCED HYPERTENSION - STRAIN DIFFERENCES IN INBRED MICE

Agonistic encounters in socially unstable dominance hierarchies are assumed to produce stress-induced hypertension in mice. Studies of this phenomenon have used the CBA mouse strain. Given the possible strain specificity of the social behavior-hypertension relationship, the present study investigated DBA/2j and C57BL/6j strains. Systolic blood pressures were obtained before and after preisolated males were either group housed or isolated. The body and adrenal weights, tail wounds and territory patrol measurements were also taken. The DBA/2j strain replicated the previous findings for CBA mice. The C57BL/6j strain did not show evidence of social dominance or hypertension. The C57BL/6j mice were apparently genetically predisposed to respond differently to the experimental conditions. Hypertension was correlated with dominance interaction rather than social instability.