Topic: helping behavior

Emotional contagion, the capacity to internally simulate another's emotional state, plays a crucial role in modulating prosocial behavior. This includes rescue behaviors, wherein individuals in a safe context intervene to release a trapped conspecific from an aversive context. However, little is known about how the perceived emotional arousal of the distressed individual influences the helper's behavior and the underlying neuronal mechanisms driving prosociability. This study explores the involvement of the dorsal hippocampus (dHPC), associated with contextual learning, in emotionally charged

In our previous study, we conducted a rescue behavior experiment. In this experiment, mice were trained to rescue a distressed familiar conspecific of the same sex by opening a door under two conditions: when the trapped mouse was in a dry or flooded chamber. We demonstrated that mice exhibit rescue behavior towards a distressed conspecific. Additionally, we discovered that inhibiting the dorsal hippocampus impairs this behavior. However, several questions regarding the specific components of impaired behavior remain. Does the emotional arousal of potential helpers increase when witnessing a d