Chronic dietary choline enrichment affects DRL responding of old, but not of adult CPBB rats

Abstract

Using adult (11-month-old) and aged (22-month-old) inbred female CPBB rats, we tested the hypothesis that chronic dietary choline supplementation affects timing behavior. The rats had received choline chloride in their tap water for about 9 months before they acquired responding on a differential reinforcement of low-rate schedule with a critical delay of 8 s (DRL-8″). One retention session and two extinction sessions were given 4 weeks after the end of acquisition. The treatment had no effect on the timing behavior of the adult rats. Choline-treated old animals made more perservation errors, i.e., responses with interresponse times (IRTs) < 2 s, than the untreated old control rats. Even after correction for burst responses, the frequency of short IRTs was higher in the treated than in the control group, indicating that choline supplementation slightly impaired timing behavior. The mechanisms underlying the action of supplemented choline are still unknown.