Adaptation of the tail suspension test to the rat.

In the tail suspension test (TST), the rat is suspended by the tail for 6 min during which the animal shows periods of agitation and immobility. The duration of the immobility is measured. Desipramine decreased the duration of immobility. The main advantages of this procedure are: the use of a simple, objective test situation; the concordance of the results (for desipramine) with the "behavioral despair" test described by Porsolt; the avoidance of the hypothermia induced by immersion in the Porsolt test.