Research Fair

At the research fair I took interest to the study conducted on rats and how their social environments effect their usage of self administered drugs. There were two conditions the rats were subject two. The first condition was the isolated group; these rats were kept away from other rats, handled little, and had no toys. The other group was the social group; this group was exposed to other rats, handled often, and had toys switched out everyday. These two groups were tested to see which hit the lever more to self-medicate. The results are skewed. The rats in the isolated groups did medicate more but neither of the groups hit the lever enough within the time frame to get clear results. A better study would have to be conducted, with the rats having better training to learn how to use the lever, to see the effects of social groups and self-dosing.