Social hierarchy assays measure independent features of competitive ability

bioRxiv · 13 Nov 2026 · Preprint · Open access

Pitesky, Wade + 4 more

The abstract is read at the publisher; the summary is JClub's.

Social hierarchies in BALB/c and C57BL/6 mice and Shank3B knockouts emerge in tube, warm spot, and void spot assays, but rank generalizes weakly across contexts.

Why it matters: It is unclear whether competitive success and hierarchy structure are comparable across different behavioral settings, because individual performance and hierarchy metrics are hard to align between assays.
What they did: Same-sex triads were tested in the tube test, warm spot assay, and void spot assay, including BALB/c and C57BL/6 mice and Shank3b-/- mice with impaired social recognition, then hierarchy structure and individual performance were compared across paradigms.
The result: Hierarchies were repeatable within each assay, yet performance was only weakly correlated between assays and social rank rarely generalized across contexts, indicating competitive ability is multidimensional and strain/sex dependent.

AI summary of the abstract · may contain errors · not medical advice · read the paper.

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