THE DEVELOPMENT AND APPLICATION OF THE OPERANT BEHAVIOR TECHNIQUE FOR STUDIES OF BEHAVIORAL PHARMACOLOGY AND TOXICOLOGY IN THE RAT
- Authors
- Corporate Authors
- Defence Research Establishment Suffield, Ralston ALTA (CAN);Grant (G A) Scientific Consultants Ltd, Nepean ONT (CAN)
- Abstract
- The investigation determined the usefulness of the operant behavior technique for behavioral pharmacology and toxicology studies in rats. In initial studies assessing the reliability of various operant behavior paradigms, the operant performance of 23.5 hr water deprived rats maintained on a fixed interval 60 second reinforcement schedule (FI 60) for a drink of saccharin solution as reward was not influenced by experimental day or time of day, two factors which might act as confounding variables in actual experiments. By comparison, performance under a fixed ratio 12-fixed interval 60 schedule was significantly reduced by experimental day and performance under a fixed ratio 10 schedule was significantly reduced in the afternoon. In subsequent drug studies, FI 60 performance was significantly reduced 1 hr after combined administration of atropine (17 mg/kg, i.p.) and HI-6 (125 mg/kg, i.p.), the recognized treatment for exposure to several nerve agents. TRUNCATED
- Report Number
- DRES-CR-25-91 — Contract Report (Final)
- Date of publication
- 01 Jan 1991
- Number of Pages
- 79
- DSTKIM No
- 91-03286
- CANDIS No
- 70477
- Format(s):
- Hardcopy;Originator's fiche received by DSIS
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