Evidence that tolerance develops to the anxiolytic effect of diazepam in rats.

The development of tolerance to the anxiolytic effect of diazepam was studied using suppression of defensive burying as an animal model of anxiolytic action. Although tolerance to the suppressive effect of diazepam was not apparent after chronic administration of diazepam when the rats were tested with a low-intensity shock, anxiolytic tolerance was detected under exactly the same drug regimen when the rats were tested with somewhat higher intensity shocks: under the latter conditions, chronically treated rats buried significantly more than acutely treated rats. Furthermore, this tolerance effect did not appear to depend upon the injection environment, the control vehicle, or the strain of rat; under each of these experimental variations rats chronically treated with diazepam buried significantly more than acutely treated rats when they had received a moderately high intensity shock. These results suggested that tolerance to the anxiolytic effects of benzodiazepines may be detectable when the stimuli eliciting anxiety are relatively intense.