en Behavioral Neuroscience Behavioral Neuroscience Original Original <p dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Introduction: </strong>Depression is one of the most frequent psychiatric disorders in the world with&nbsp;occurs with higher incidence in women. In the present study, the effect of water-alcoholic extract&nbsp;of Papaver rhoeas L. on forced swimming test (FST) in Swiss-Webster mice were examined.<br> <strong>Methods:</strong> We used Swiss-Webster mice (20-25 g) to execute FST on them. The plant extract (1,&nbsp;10, 30, and 100 mg/kg) was injected to the animals 30 minutes before each session. Fluoxetine&nbsp;(20 mg/kg) was used as standard antidepressant drug. In another group of animals, 30 minutes&nbsp;after extract administration, blood samples were taken from retro-orbital sinus for corticosterone&nbsp;assay. Yet in third group, the drugs were injected to the animals and 30 minutes later, their&nbsp;activities were tested in an open field apparatus.<br> <strong>Results:</strong> Our experiments showed that the extract efficiently reduced FST time both in male&nbsp;and female mice dose-dependently. This effect was comparable with fluoxetine. In addition,&nbsp;corticosterone assay indicated that plasma corticosterone in animals which received extract was&nbsp;higher than those amounts in fluoxetine and saline controls. Moreover, the animals did not show&nbsp;any motor activity deficit in all doses of the extract and fluoxetine compared to saline control.<br> <strong>Conclusion:</strong> The extract of Papaver rhoeas can reduce immobility time which is comparable&nbsp;to the effect of fluoxetine. Also the effect of the extract is contrary to its effects on plasma&nbsp;corticosterone level and or animals&rsquo; activity.</p> Papaver rhoeas, Fluoxetine, Corticosterone, Locomotion, Stress 195 202 http://bcn.iums.ac.ir/browse.php?a_code=A-10-15-6&slc_lang=en&sid=1 Naser Osanloo 1370031947532846007897 1370031947532846007897 No Neuroscience Research Center, Baqiyatallah (a.s.) University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Akram Najafi-Abedi 1370031947532846007898 1370031947532846007898 No Neuroscience Research Center, Baqiyatallah (a.s.) University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Fatemeh Jafari 1370031947532846007899 1370031947532846007899 No Neuroscience Research Center, Baqiyatallah (a.s.) University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Farshid Javid 1370031947532846007900 1370031947532846007900 No Neuroscience Research Center, Baqiyatallah (a.s.) University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Mohsen Pirpiran 1370031947532846007901 1370031947532846007901 No Neuroscience Research Center, Baqiyatallah (a.s.) University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Mohammad-Reza Memar-Jafari 1370031947532846007902 1370031947532846007902 No Neuroscience Research Center, Baqiyatallah (a.s.) University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Seyed Ali Mousavi-Khosravi 1370031947532846007903 1370031947532846007903 No Neuroscience Research Center, Baqiyatallah (a.s.) University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Mohammad Rahimzadeh-Behzadi 1370031947532846007904 1370031947532846007904 No Neuroscience Research Center, Baqiyatallah (a.s.) University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Mina Ranjbaran minaranjbaran@rocketmail.com 1370031947532846007905 1370031947532846007905 No Neuroscience Research Center, Baqiyatallah (a.s.) University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Hedayat Sahraei hsahraei1343@gmail.com 1370031947532846007906 1370031947532846007906 Yes Neuroscience Research Center, Baqiyatallah (a.s.) University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.