Groups of male Sprague-Dawley rats 31 to 730 days old were placed in an open field and scores were obtained of ‘exploratory’ and ‘nonexploratory’ responses. Young recently weaned rats (31-day-old) and young-mature rats (94-day-old) had high scores of exploration responses and low scores of nonexploration responses in comparison with adolescent rats (52 or 73 days old) or older rats (365 or 730 days old). After reaching maturity (94 days old), exploration decreased with increasing age.
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