ESR2 and Anxiety: Estradiol and ERs, specifically ERα and ERβ, have been found to have protective effects against anxiety- (Lund et al., 2005; Walf and Frye, 2006, 2010; Filova et al., 2015) and depressive-like (Galea et al., 2001; Walf et al., 2009; Österlund, 2010) behaviors.