With the rise in diagnoses of social deficit disorders comes an increased demand in elucidating the neural mechanisms that underlie social behavior. In the central nervous system arginine-vasopressin (AVP) has been shown to effect social communication, such as aggression, pair bonding, and maternal behavior, and many AVP cell bodies and fibers are distributed in a sexually dimorphic fashion. One such area is the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis (BNST), with males having more AVP cells than females, thus making it a likely candidate in the control of male specific social behavior. We found that activation of this specific cell population using optogenetics in socially-naïve males does not induce a place preference, affect male territorial aggression, or investigation towards females.