Research data · Animal model
Social isolation
From 2021 to 2025, 276 animal research papers mentioned social isolation and at least one behavioral test.
That is 1.5 times the 183 papers of 2011 to 2015. Between the same two periods, all the animal research papers that mention any of the 90 tests we count grew more slowly, to 1.2 times as many.
The tests mentioned with social isolation
The forced swim test appears in 19% of these papers and in 9.3% of all 32,277 papers that mention a test. That makes it 2.1 times as common in this research. Each bar is one test, with how many of the 276 papers from 2021 to 2025 mention it, and what share that is. A paper that mentions two tests counts under both.
The 15 tests these papers mention most
All 55 tests these papers mention
| Test | Papers | Share of the 276 papers |
|---|---|---|
| Open field | 57 | 21% |
| Forced swim test | 53 | 19% |
| Elevated plus maze | 49 | 18% |
| Novel object recognition | 27 | 10% |
| Sucrose preference test | 25 | 9% |
| Morris water maze | 25 | 9% |
| Social interaction test | 21 | 8% |
| Three-chamber sociability test | 20 | 7% |
| Self-administration | 18 | 7% |
| Prepulse inhibition and acoustic startle | 17 | 6% |
| Y-maze | 16 | 6% |
| Tail suspension test | 15 | 5% |
| Fear conditioning | 14 | 5% |
| Operant conditioning | 14 | 5% |
| Resident-intruder test | 14 | 5% |
| Wheel running | 14 | 5% |
| Passive avoidance | 13 | 5% |
| Light-dark box | 12 | 4% |
| Conditioned place preference | 10 | 4% |
| Self-grooming | 6 | 2% |
| Elevated zero maze | 5 | 2% |
| Marble burying | 5 | 2% |
| Novelty-suppressed feeding | 5 | 2% |
| Splash test | 5 | 2% |
| Novel tank test | 4 | 1% |
| Barnes maze | 4 | 1% |
| Treadmill running | 4 | 1% |
| Hot plate | 3 | 1% |
| Social operant tasks | 3 | 1% |
| Hole-board | 3 | 1% |
| Tail flick | 2 | 1% |
| Von Frey test | 2 | 1% |
| T-maze | 2 | 1% |
| Five-choice serial reaction time task | 2 | 1% |
| Object location test | 2 | 1% |
| Touchscreen operant tasks | 2 | 1% |
| Adhesive removal test | 2 | 1% |
| Grip strength | 1 | under 1% |
| Cincinnati water maze | 1 | under 1% |
| Attentional set shifting | 1 | under 1% |
| Formalin test | 1 | under 1% |
| Water Y-maze | 1 | under 1% |
| Learned helplessness | 1 | under 1% |
| Social approach and avoidance | 1 | under 1% |
| Nest building | 1 | under 1% |
| Burrowing | 1 | under 1% |
| Looming stimulus | 1 | under 1% |
| Predator odor exposure | 1 | under 1% |
| Negative geotaxis and climbing assays | 1 | under 1% |
| Beam walking | 1 | under 1% |
| Tube test for social dominance | 1 | under 1% |
| Rotarod | 1 | under 1% |
| Active place avoidance | 1 | under 1% |
| Runway | 1 | under 1% |
| Ladder rung walking | 1 | under 1% |
Tests named in 30 or more of these papers link to a page on that test with social isolation. To count the papers that mention two or more tests together, use the test battery tool.
Papers by year
Animal research papers that mention social isolation and a behavioral test, by year, 2001 to 2026
The 2026 bar counts papers added to PubMed by November 8, 2026.
- Papers in a full year
- 2026 so far
Show the counts for each year
| Year | Papers |
|---|---|
| 2001 | 16 |
| 2002 | 9 |
| 2003 | 16 |
| 2004 | 16 |
| 2005 | 16 |
| 2006 | 21 |
| 2007 | 13 |
| 2008 | 16 |
| 2009 | 36 |
| 2010 | 26 |
| 2011 | 36 |
| 2012 | 36 |
| 2013 | 34 |
| 2014 | 37 |
| 2015 | 40 |
| 2016 | 41 |
| 2017 | 41 |
| 2018 | 38 |
| 2019 | 48 |
| 2020 | 60 |
| 2021 | 67 |
| 2022 | 46 |
| 2023 | 47 |
| 2024 | 50 |
| 2025 | 66 |
| 2026 (part year) | 57 |
Papers that mention social isolation and a test fell from 67 in 2021 to 46 in 2022, then rose to 66 in 2025. Part of this dip may come from PubMed's indexing rather than from fewer studies. We take a paper's species from PubMed's indexing when the indexing names one. Otherwise PubTator 3, NCBI's text-mining service, has to find a species in the title or abstract, or the paper is not counted. Papers that PubMed indexed under the subject heading Animals also fell and rose, from 200,221 in 2021 to 156,447 in 2023 and 235,479 in 2025.
Disease models in papers that mention social isolation
Each bar is one disease model, with how many of the 276 papers from 2021 to 2025 are tagged with it, and what share that is. The model comes from the paper's MeSH terms, the subject headings the National Library of Medicine adds when it indexes a paper. A paper without MeSH terms gets its model from PubTator 3, NCBI's text-mining service, if PubTator 3 finds the disease in the title or abstract. A paper can count under more than one model.
Papers from 2021 to 2025 by disease model
Which species the papers used
Each bar is a share of the 276 papers from 2021 to 2025. A paper can use more than one species, so the shares can add to more than 100%.
Species
“Other animals” counts papers that use none of the species this chart names.
NIH funding
53 of the 276 papers (19%) had NIH funding. NIDA funded the most, 17 of them. A paper counts as NIH-funded when its PubMed record lists an NIH grant, or when NIH RePORTER links it to an NIH project.
NIH-funded papers by institute
Each share is of the NIH-funded papers. A paper with grants from two institutes counts under both.
The most cited papers from 2021 to 2025
These papers from 2021 to 2025 mention social isolation and a behavioral test and have the most citations, as counted by NIH's iCite on November 5, 2026. We show four of the five most cited papers and leave out one because of words in its title.
Brain Behav Immun, 2021. 231 citations.
J Neuroinflammation, 2022. 73 citations.
Assessing the effects of stress on feeding behaviors in laboratory mice.
Elife, 2022. 65 citations.
Sci Rep, 2023. 64 citations.
How we counted
A paper counts here when it is animal research and its title or abstract mentions social isolation and at least one of the 90 behavioral tests. A count is a number of papers, not of experiments, labs or animals. A paper that mentions social isolation only in its methods is missed, so the count runs low.
A paper is animal research when its MeSH terms name an animal species. If they name none, NCBI's text-mining service PubTator 3 has to find one in the title or abstract. Papers on animals other than mice, rats, zebrafish, flies and primates count only when they also mention a test. Many of them study people or use the same words for something else.
The search terms for social isolation are in the download Animal models and brain techniques. The counts in the chart of tests are in Tests mentioned with each model or technique. The full method, with each source and its terms of use, is on our main page, Behavioral tests in published research.
More animal models
Each animal model with 100 or more papers from 2021 to 2025 that mention a test has a page. These are the others, each with that count.
- Chronic unpredictable stress 973 papers
- Exercise 916 papers
- Lipopolysaccharide (LPS) 876 papers
- High-fat diet 868 papers
- Restraint stress 553 papers
- Streptozotocin diabetes 510 papers
- Middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO) 494 papers
- Nerve injury 485 papers
- Scopolamine 483 papers
- Spinal cord injury 395 papers
- Maternal separation and early-life stress 343 papers
- Traumatic brain injury (CCI, fluid percussion, weight drop) 334 papers
- Chemotherapy drugs 323 papers
- Carrageenan 317 papers
- Ovariectomy 309 papers
- Sleep deprivation 306 papers
- Social defeat stress 304 papers
- Environmental enrichment 295 papers
- Carotid artery occlusion (BCCAO, 2VO) 264 papers
- 6-OHDA 255 papers
- MPTP 249 papers
- D-galactose 244 papers
- Complete Freund's adjuvant (CFA) 216 papers
- Pentylenetetrazole (PTZ) 212 papers
- Predator stress 206 papers
- MK-801 190 papers
- Streptozotocin in the brain (ICV-STZ) 174 papers
- Gut microbiota depletion or transplant 166 papers
- Kainic acid or pilocarpine seizures 161 papers
- Sepsis 161 papers
- Rotenone 160 papers
- Aluminum chloride 157 papers
- Prenatal valproic acid 149 papers
- Single prolonged stress 142 papers
- Neonatal hypoxia-ischemia 125 papers
- Radiation exposure 125 papers
- Calorie restriction and fasting 120 papers
- Intracerebral hemorrhage 114 papers
- Intermittent or chronic hypoxia 113 papers
- Chronic corticosterone 109 papers
- Reserpine 109 papers
- Maternal immune activation 103 papers
How to cite
APA
ConductScience. (2026, November 13). Behavioral tests with social isolation [Data set]. https://conductscience.com/resources/data/animal-models/social-isolation
BibTeX
@misc{conductscience_social_isolation_2026,
author = {{ConductScience}},
title = {Behavioral tests with social isolation},
year = {2026},
month = nov,
url = {https://conductscience.com/resources/data/animal-models/social-isolation},
note = {Data set, released November 13, 2026},
}Shop apparatus by test
Our store sells apparatus for nine of the 10 tests these papers mention most, all but prepulse inhibition and acoustic startle.
