Vogel Conflict Test

The Vogel conflict test is a model of conditioned anxiety built by punishing inhibitory behaviors and is widely used to assess potential anxiolytics. In particular, it has been used to characterize drugs that interact with GABAergic, glutamatergic and monoaminergic networks.

Our company offers a wide range of customized anti-anxiety drug testing solutions based on the classic Vogel conflict test. Different experimental strategies such as water deprivation or food deprivation are adopted according to the client's research demands. Our extensive experience allows us to meet all of our customers' research needs in identifying novel anxiolytic drugs and their mechanisms of action.

Experimental Principle

The Vogel conflict test model exploits the paradoxical conflict between the thirst for water in water-abstaining animals and the fear of being electrically stimulated when drinking. In Vogel conflict tests, animals are punished with electric shocks when they try to obtain food or water. Therefore, the number of times the animal goes to get food or water will decrease. When anxiolytic drugs are injected, the number of times the experimental animals go up to get food or water increases even though the animals will still be punished.

Fig. 1 Vogel conflict test. (La-Vu, 2020)

Experimental Flow

The Vogel conflict test can be performed in addition to drinking water deprivation, but also in food deprivation. We can customize suitable experimental protocols according to the specific research demands of our customers to ensure the scientific rationality of the experimental results.

Here, we present the procedure of the Vogel conflict test as an example of the water deprivation situation.

• Habituation session

Experimental animals are water-deprived for 48 h prior to testing. During the first 24 hours of water deprivation, they were allowed to drink freely in the test cage for 3 minutes in order to find the spout of the drinking bottle.

• Testing period

During the next 24 hours of water deprivation, the experimental animals received intravenous injections of the agent under test. Thirty minutes after drug injection, each mouse was taken individually to the test cage to drink water. During a testing period of 3 minutes, an animal received a 0.5 miliAmpere shock after every 20 licks.

Our test device automatically records the number of water licks and electric shocks, and an increase in the number of shocks per 3 minutes is considered to be an indicator of lower anxiety behavior.

Our company offers professional one-stop services from experimental design to results analysis to bring breakthroughs to your research.