DATA-DRIVEN ANALYSIS OF NATURALISTIC BEHAVIOR REVEALS BEHAVIORAL REORGANIZATION IN CHRONIC PAIN

Chronic pain induces long-lasting neural and behavioral alterations, yet its impact on natural, self-generated behavior remains poorly characterized. Most preclinical pain studies rely on reflexive, pain sensitivity assays, which provide limited insight into how chronic pain disrupts spontaneous behavioral organization. Here, a quantitative, data-driven behavioral framework was used to assess how chronic neuropathic pain interferes with natural behaviors in freely moving mice.
Neuropathic pain was induced using the sciatic nerve injury (SNI) model, and mechanical and thermal hypersensitivity were confirmed using von Frey filaments and hot plate assays. To characterize behavioral changes beyond evoked responses, animals were continuously recorded in an open-field arena during baseline, acute, and chronic pain phases. In parallel, an induced- grooming paradigm was applied to probe competition between externally triggered grooming and spontaneous pain-related body-directed behaviors.
Mouse posture and movement were tracked using automated pose estimation, followed by unsupervised behavioral segmentation to identify behavioral states across cohorts without predefined labels and compare those cohorts across experimental conditions.
This unbiased quantification of spontaneous behavior provides a translational framework for the next step of linking the underlying physiology with the behavioral expression of chronic pain.