Trichotillomania (TTM) is a body-focused repetitive behavior disorder that affects approximately 0.5–2% of individuals, with females being four times more likely to develop it than males. The condition causes considerable emotional distress and disruption of normal daily activities. The inbred C57BL/6J mouse strain has been identified as a potential experimental model for TTM because it exhibits behavioral and clinical features similar to those seen in humans with the disorder. Since alcohol-preferring P rats also display comparable behavioral and physiological traits, they were proposed as an additional model organism. In this study, 112 female P rats were video recorded for 15 minutes following exposure to a light water mist, and their grooming activities—including oral, manual, and scratching behaviors—were analyzed. A marked increase in scratching and oral grooming was found to predict later skin lesion formation. These observations indicate that P rats could serve as another suitable model for investigating TTM, offering the benefit of genetic variability (non-inbred), which more accurately represents human populations. Employing this model may contribute to the identification of preventive and therapeutic strategies for TTM and related body-focused repetitive disorders.
