AR and Anxiety: DEHP-induced neurotoxicity in male rats has been confirmed, as male mice treated with low and high doses of DEHP exhibited behavioral deficits, including spatial memory impairments and anxiety-like behavior, and these effects were associated with androgen receptor (AR) downregulation in the hippocampus (Barakat et al. 2018).In addition, DEHP is regarded as gender-specific because male mice, but not female mice, treated with DEHP exhibit spatial learning and memory deficiencies (Zhao et al. 2020).