A recent study paired adult prairie voles with one male sib for five days and then individually housed the animals. Some were housed with continued “social,” or at least visual, auditory, and olfactory, access to their sibling through a wire mesh screen, and others were housed alone. All had access to water and ethanol and drinking preference was assessed. Isolated voles drank less than those with social access to a littermate. Drinking in littermates housed with access was highly correlated, while sibling drinking in isolated pairs was not. (Anacker & Ryabinin, 2009).
