Configural integration of temporal and contextual information in rats: Automated measurement in appetitive and aversive preparations.

摘要: Two experiments investigated the capacity of rats to learn configural discriminations requiring integration contextual (where) with temporal (when) information. In Experiment 1, during morning training sessions, food was delivered in context A and not B, whereas afternoon sessions B A. Rats acquired this discrimination over course 20 days. 2 employed a directly analogous aversive conditioning procedure which footshock served place food. This allowed acquisition be assessed through changes activity contextual + temporal configurations (i.e., inactivity or freezing) modulation immediate impact presentations post-shock bursts). Both measures provided evidence learning 12 days, final test showing that presentation resulted more nonreinforced than reinforced configurations. These behavioral effects reveal important parallels between (i) involving components allied episodic memory (ii) simple conditioning.