Name: using clicker training and social observation to teach rats to voluntarily change cages
Uploaded: 2018-10-25T14:30:00
Description: Watch this Scientific Journal Video about Using Clicker Training and Social Observation to Teach Rats to Voluntarily Change Cages at JoVE.com

The authors are most grateful to Thomas Wacker for his technical support. We further thank Dr. Mirjam Roth for her kind support.

The handling of the rats and the experimental procedures were conducted in accordance with European, national, and institutional guidelines for animal care.
1. Acclimatization and Habituation
NOTE: If rats were not transported, the acclimatization and habituation time can be reduced. For noninvasive identification, color the tail with skin-friendly marker.
<ol>
	<li>Week 1: Acclimatization 
	NOTE: Two sessions should be performed during the f...

<ol>
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The protocol described above is a useful extended application of our previously described clicker training protocol for laboratory mice10. The implementation requires only minutes per day over a total of seven weeks, including acclimatization, habituation and clicker training. For feasibility, this protocol was limited to week days with sessions of approximately ten minutes per pair of rats. The protocol can appear to be time-consuming to establish in large rat colonies, but if the animals are des...

Routine procedures can cause stress in laboratory animals1,2,3,4. It has been shown that cage changing does increase cardiovascular parameters and general activity in rats4,5,6. Such stress responses can at least be partially due to the physical disturbance and handling associated with cage changing procedures rather than the new unfamiliar environment2,4. Of particular importance is the negative effect of stress on the well-being of the regarded animal7. Further, stress induces changes in behavior and in other body parameters, including the autonomic nervous system, the neuroendocrine system and the immune system. Therefore, stress is often referred to as a possible source of unexpected deviations across animal experiments and should be avoided as much as possible in high-quality animal research7,8. One way to reduce stress in laboratory animals is by training. Training animals can generally be a very helpful tool for laboratory animal management and is, in fact, demanded by EU Directive 2010/63/EU9. Training can serve as a form of enrichment and helps to prepare animals for experiments; thus, training contributes to sustaining and enhancing well-being in laboratory settings10,11,12. A possible training method is positive reinforcement training (PRT). PRT is a form of operant conditioning where a reward (e.g., a food reward), is linked with a desired behavior13. This form of training is already commonly used in laboratory settings for nonhuman primates in order to reduce stress and to enhance well-being and has gained popularity in various other animal species10,13,14,15,16. Training of voluntary movement is also frequently used for refining animal husbandry management17,18,19. PRT is not only a helpful tool for cooperation when working with animals; it likewise is generally beneficial for the animals&#39; well-being, regardless of whether the trained behavior is directly used20. The positive reinforcement training protocol described here aims to avoid any form of stress during routinely performed cage changes by giving the rat the opportunity to voluntarily participate in the procedure.
In addition to the possible stress for the animals, working processes in animal facilities always provide pitfalls for the maintenance of hygiene status, especially as the direct contact between laboratory animals and animal caretakers bears the risk of hygiene contamination. In animal facilities specializing in rodents, the transfer of the animals from dirty into clean cages provides a regular and high workload. This procedure usually includes direct contact between animals and humans and thus represents a hygienic risk factor due to the possible transfer of pathogens settled on the human skin21. Aside from transfer from other animal vectors, pathogenic and nonpathogenic organisms intrude animal facilities most frequently via humans22,23. As reduced health is associated with reduced well-being, even subclinical infections can be a cause for nonreproducible experimental results, and this should clearly be avoided24,25. On this account, training animals to voluntary change cages further enables the conduction of the cage change after the training with hardly any direct contact between animal and animal caretaker, thereby reducing a potential hygienic risk while performing experimental procedures.
Our protocol for training rats to voluntarily change cages can be a helpful tool for laboratory rat management, as it links the training as a form of cognitive enrichment with performance of routine work. Accordingly, our protocol is an animal-friendly procedure that helps to increase the well-being of rats in laboratory animal facilities. As the cage change after the training phase can be performed with hardly any direct contact between animal and animal caretaker, it might additionally help to maintain hygiene at a high level and therefore further improve animal research.

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			<td height="20" style="height:20px;width:224px;">Target Stick with Clicker</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">Trixie</td>
			<td style="width:104px;">2282</td>
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			<td height="20" style="height:20px;">Metal Pipe (Alu Flexrohr nw 100)</td>
			<td>Rotheigner</td>
			<td></td>
			<td>available in construction marktes</td>
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			<td height="20" style="height:20px;">White Chocolate/ white chocolate cream</td>
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			<td>Company doesn&#39;t matter, preferable organic quality</td>
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			<td height="21" style="height:21px;">Prism Version 6.0 for Mac</td>
			<td>GraphPad Software</td>
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using clicker training and social observation to teach rats to voluntarily change cages

Cage cleaning is a routinely performed husbandry procedure and is known to induce stress in laboratory rats. As stress can have a negative impact on well-being and can affect the comparability and reproducibility of research results, the amount of stress experienced by laboratory animals should be minimized and avoided when possible. Further, the direct contact between the rat and animal caretaker during the cage change bears hygiene risks and therefore possibly negatively impacts the well-being of the rats and the quality of the research. 
Our protocol aims to improve the routinely performed cage changing procedure. For this reason, we present a feasible protocol that enables rats to learn via clicker training and observation to voluntarily change to a clean cage. This training helps to reduce stress caused by the physical disturbance and handling associated with the cage changes and concurrently enables a reduction in direct contact between animal and animal caretaker after the training phase is completed.
The implementation of clicker training to rats is fast and easy. Rats are generally interested in the training and efficiently learn the desired behavior, which entails changing cages through a pipe. Even without training, the rats learn to perform the desired behavior by observation, as 80% of the observational learning group successfully changed cages when tested. The training further helps to establish a relationship of trust between trainer and animal. As hygiene and well-being are both very important in animal experiments, this protocol might also help to improve high-quality research.

The training was conducted on a cohort of ten female Lister hooded (LD) rats. Ten untrained but gently handled female LD rats served as a control group. Gentle handling means that the rats were only lifted by their body and not lifted at the base of the tail. To evaluate the learning by observation, we added one further group of 10 female LD rats, which were not trained but were cage-mates of the trained rats and were able to observe the training. All rats completed the acclimatization an...

Watch this Scientific Journal Video about Using Clicker Training and Social Observation to Teach Rats to Voluntarily Change Cages at JoVE.com

Using Clicker Training and Social Observation to Teach Rats to Voluntarily Change Cages

This protocol introduces a method of cage change for rats via clicker training. Rats learn the desired behavior not only by direct training but also by observational learning. The implementation of this fast and easy protocol might help to improve well-being and hygiene in rodent facilities.

Cage cleaning is a routinely performed husbandry procedure and is known to induce stress in laboratory rats. As stress can have a negative impact on ...

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