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Psychotic Lab Mice

Posted by timothy on from the jury-of-their-peers dept.

meltoast writes "We send lab mice through a maze to see their reactions and then take that information and apply it to our knowledge of the human psyche. Well, what if those mice are completely out of their minds? Discover recently ran an article showing that mice kept in a standard laboratory environment may be crazy. 'In one sequence, a mouse climbs the stainless-steel walls of its cage, hangs from the ceiling by its forelegs while gnawing on the bars, then drops to the floor, only to repeat the process endlessly. On the other side of the cage, a second mouse performs backflips, one per second, for up to 30 minutes at a time.'"

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  1. This isn't very surprising... by DarkDust · · Score: 4, Informative

    and I bet this applies to rats as well (which are, biological, just very big mice). I have some pet rats and a big cage, but normally they just run around in my living room... and they really love to run around.

    When I have them in their cage for more than, say, three days they grab their bars like some prisoners and stare at me with very sad eyes :-) After some days they can really get depressed.

    So now normally mice and rat cages in laboratories are way smaller than mine is (I know since a friend of mine works in a laboratory with rats). And they are not allowed to run around. When my rats get depressed after a few days, then I have no doubt most mice/rats get crazy after some months.

    Imagine having nothing more than your living room to walk around, your whole life... oh wait, we geeks know that very well ;-)