Foraging on the radial-arm maze: Effects of altering the reward at a target location |
| |
| Authors: | John D Batson Michael R Best Deborah L Phillips Hemlata Patel Kevin R Gilleland |
| |
| Institution: | 1. Psychology Department, Furman University, 29613, Greenville, SC
2. Southern Methodist University, Dallas, Texas
|
| |
| Abstract: | Thirsty rats were trained to collect small water rewards from the end of each arm of an eight-arm radial maze. During these training trials and subsequent testing trials, the subjects were allowed to choose a maximum of eight arms. “Preference” for a target maze location was studied by noting when, in the sequence of eight choices, the target was selected. During testing, when one maze location was consistently devoid of water, rats decreased their preference for this arm over trials (Experiment 1). Similarly, rats that learned a saccharin-lithium association demonstrated lower preferences for a maze location that consistently held the conditioned saccharin solution. This was true for animals that received saccharin-lithium conditioning on the maze (Experiment 3A) and for animals conditioned to saccharin in a separate context (Experiment 3B). An increase in preference for a target maze location consistently containing a sweet chocolate milk solution was observed in animals that were water- and food-deprived (Experiment 2). These studies demonstrate that animals will modify their responses toward (preferences for) maze locations that predictably contain an altered reward. |
| |
| Keywords: | |
| 本文献已被 SpringerLink 等数据库收录！ |
|
