A Cuing Treatment Reestablishes the US Preexposure Effect Following Context Change

Abstract

A single experiment is reported in which a cuing treatment is used to transfer the US preexposure effect from one context to another. All rats received exposure to unsignaled footshocks in context B or C and then received CSUS pairings in the same context (B). Results indicated that animals receiving preexposure and training in the same context (B-B) evidenced the US preexposure effect (attenuated conditioning to the CS), whereas animals in the context change (C-B) condition failed to evidence the US preexposure effect. Importantly, animals preexposed in C and receiving a cuing treatment in the new context (B) prior to CS-US pairings did not differ from animals receiving all treatments in the same context. Thus, cuing resulted in animals behaving as though the unsignaled US presentations had occurred in the new context (B). These results are discussed in terms of the effect of cuing on the modification of memory attributes.