SwiftRESEARCH · Research services
Behavioral satiety sequence (BSS) scoring
Satiety scoring for appetite and weight-loss research: how eating gives way to grooming, activity and rest after a meal, scored from video by trained reviewers. Bring recordings you already have, or plan the capture with us.
- Species
- Rats and mice
- View
- A camera on each observation cage, with the food in view
What we measure
The endpoints, defined with you before scoring
Time in each behavior
Eating, drinking, grooming, activity (moving, rearing, sniffing) and resting through the observation period, in the time bins your protocol sets.
The sequence
Whether eating gives way to grooming and activity and then to rest in the natural order, and when resting overtakes eating.
Duration and bouts
The duration and number of bouts of each behavior from continuous scoring, or the time sampling your protocol uses.
Food intake alongside
Your food weights for the same period, in the same table as the behavior.
Two ways to start
Footage you have, or a capture we plan with you
Analyze footage you already have
Send authorized recordings and your study design. We score a sample first and tell you what can be measured, then the full set.
Capture with us
We plan the recording with you on a supported camera setup, your team runs the test under your approved protocol, and we take it from the footage to reviewed results.
How it is scored: Scored from video by trained reviewers, against the ethogram agreed with you, and checked by a person before results reach you.
What you receive
Results you can check, and what we need from you
You receive
- A table per animal and time bin: time in each behavior, bouts, and the point where resting overtakes eating.
- Satiety sequence profiles per group: each behavior across the time bins.
- Scored examples on your own video, so you can check the scoring.
- The ethogram and scoring rules used, so the scoring can be repeated.
We need
- Video of the observation period from when food is presented (often 60 minutes), with the food in view.
- Food weights before and after, and your feeding and treatment schedule.
- Your ethogram, or we agree one with you.
- Animal IDs and groups, coded if you want scoring blind to group.
The test
Where it comes from
After a meal, rats stop eating, groom and explore for a short time, then rest (Antin and colleagues, 1975). Halford, Wanninayake and Blundell (1998) used this sequence to ask whether a drug lowers food intake through satiety, which keeps the sequence in order, or by interfering with it through sedation, hyperactivity, nausea-like effects or a change in palatability.
- Antin J, Gibbs J, Holt J, Young RC, Smith GP (1975). Cholecystokinin elicits the complete behavioral sequence of satiety in rats. Journal of Comparative and Physiological Psychology 89:784–790. doi:10.1037/h0077040
- Halford JC, Wanninayake SC, Blundell JE (1998). Behavioral satiety sequence (BSS) for the diagnosis of drug action on food intake. Pharmacology Biochemistry and Behavior 61:159–168. doi:10.1016/s0091-3057(98)00032-x
Questions
What is the behavioral satiety sequence?
The order in which behavior changes after a meal: eating, then grooming and activity, then rest. It is used to see whether a treatment that lowers food intake keeps that natural order or disrupts it.
Who scores the videos?
Trained reviewers, against the ethogram agreed with you, and blind to group if you send coded files.
Continuous scoring or time sampling?
Whichever your protocol uses. Continuous scoring gives the duration and number of bouts of each behavior; Halford and colleagues (1998) recommend it for defining the sequence.
Do you run the animals?
Your team, or the facility you work with, runs the study under your approved protocol. We help plan the recording, then score and analyze it.
How is it priced?
Each project gets a written scope and quote: inputs, deliverables, how results are reviewed and the price. Academic labs get a discount, shown in the quote.
More assays
Other assays we score
Novel object recognition (NOR)
Exploration of each object and the discrimination index, phase by phase.
Kaolin pica (rats)
Kaolin and food intake per animal and period, as a nausea-like measure.
Home-cage activity and sleep-like rest
24-hour activity, light and dark phases, and sleep-like rest bouts.
Social interaction and three-chamber tests
Three-chamber sociability and social novelty, and free interaction.
Open field test
Distance moved, time in the center, thigmotaxis and rearing.
We also scope the elevated plus maze, Y-maze, fear conditioning (freezing), nest building and marble burying, and other tests: describe yours.
Tell us about your study
The endpoint, your species, and whether you already have footage or need help capturing it.