Social Interaction (Crawley 3-Chamber)

The Crawley three-chamber sociability test is the most widely used assay for social approach behavior in rodents. The apparatus consists of three interconnected chambers: the test subject is placed in the center chamber and allowed to freely explore an empty wire cup in one side chamber versus a wire cup containing a novel stimulus mouse in the opposite side chamber. Time spent in proximity to the social stimulus versus the empty cup quantifies sociability — the basic motivation to approach and interact with a conspecific.

A second phase tests social novelty preference: the empty cup is replaced with a second, unfamiliar stimulus mouse, and the subject's preference for the new stranger over the now-familiar mouse is measured. This two-phase design dissociates social approach motivation (Phase 1) from social recognition memory (Phase 2). The test is a core phenotyping tool for autism spectrum disorder models, where reduced sociability and impaired social novelty preference are robust translational endpoints.

ConductMaze automates the three-chamber test by controlling motorized guillotine doors between chambers, tracking subject position via overhead video or IR beam arrays, and computing zone-specific time, entries, and proximity measures. The software manages timed phases, counterbalances stimulus mouse placement, and generates social preference and discrimination indices automatically.