Abstract
The possibility of the presence of inter-individual emotional differences and the memory performance of rats was examined in the elevated T-maze. Two kinds of aversively motivated behaviors, inhibitory avoidance and escape learning, were measured. Based on the number of trials to achieve a learning criterion, rats were divided into two subgroups with either low or high avoidance reactivity (LAR or HAR, respectively). Retention test avoidance latencies showed that HAR animals had better avoidance memory (Mann-Whitney rank sum test, P = 0.0035). No such differences were found for the escape component of this test. These data suggest that individual emotional differences affect inhibitory avoidance performance, which may help to explain the dispersion of the data observed in other studies using this paradigm.
Highlights
A large number of studies have described strains of rats selected on the basis of their emotional reactivity and conditionability
The possibility of the presence of inter-individual emotional differences and the memory performance of rats was examined in the elevated T-maze
Retention test avoidance latencies showed that HAR animals had better avoidance memory (Mann-Whitney rank sum test, P = 0.0035). No such differences were found for the escape component of this test. These data suggest that individual emotional differences affect inhibitory avoidance performance, which may help to explain the dispersion of the data observed in other studies using this paradigm
Summary
A large number of studies have described strains of rats selected on the basis of their emotional reactivity and conditionability. The possibility of the presence of inter-individual emotional differences and the memory performance of rats was examined in the elevated T-maze. Two kinds of aversively motivated behaviors, inhibitory avoidance and escape learning, were measured.
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