Stressors affect the response of male and female rats to clomipramine in a model of behavioral despair (forced swim test)

These results demonstrate that duration and intensity of stressful stimuli may deeply affect the behavioral response of rats in forced swim test and influence clomipramine effect in this behavioral model depending on gender-based variables, probably of the hormonal type. Plasma corticosterone levels correlate with the behavioral response to clomipramine treatment suggesting that reactivity of hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal axis to stress may be involved in the antidepressant effect of this drug.