Enhancement of Pavlovian conditioned inhibition achieved by posttraining inflation of the training excitor

Abstract

In two conditioned lick suppression experiments using water-deprived rats, we examined the effects of following Pavlovian conditioned inhibition training (i.e., A–US/AX-NoUS) with pairings of the training excitor (A) and the unconditioned stimulus (US). Experiments 1 and 2 assessed the effects of this posttraining inflation treatment on Pavlovian conditioned inhibition using a summation test and a retardation test, respectively. Both experiments revealed that subjects exposed to inflation treatment demonstrated behavior indicative of enhanced conditioned inhibition compared to subjects that did not receive inflation treatment. The results in conjunction with other recent findings suggest that posttraining associative deflation (i.e., extinction of A) and inflation effects are more symmetrical than has previously been realized.