Preclinical literature supports detrimental effects of stress on alcohol consumption and alcohol seeking, although there is a complex interplay between biological factors governing stress responses and the methodological variations in stress application and alcohol exposure.25 We previously reported that exposure to the SDPS paradigm facilitated acquisition of alcohol SA in demanding, fixed schedules of reinforcement in the general population.20 Here, we replicated this finding, in fact showing that SDPS increases alcohol intake independently of the presence of depressive‐like symptoms, namely, affective and cognitive deficits. In particular, we report that SDPS‐resilient animals, which exhibit no difference in the SAA and OPR tasks as compared with controls,21 showed increased alcohol acquisition during fixed‐ratio responding.
