The Overtraining Reversal Effect in Rats: A Function of Task Difficulty

1972 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 291-298 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles L. Richman ◽  
Karol Knoblock ◽  
Wayne Coussens
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Learning ◽  
Task Difficulty ◽  
Brightness Discrimination ◽  
Spatial Task ◽  
Learning Problem ◽  
Reversal Performance ◽  
Reversal Problem ◽  
Reversal Effect ◽  
Spatial Tasks ◽  
Equal Difficulty

Two experiments were conducted with rats. The first study showed that in the T-maze a brightness discrimination learning problem was more difficult than a spatial learning problem, but in a Ross-maze a brightness problem was less difficult than a spatial task. T-maze brightness and Ross-maze spatial tasks were found to be of equal difficulty. In the second experiment rats were trained either on a brightness or spatial discrimination reversal problem in the Ross-maze. It was found that overtraining facilitated reversal performance in the spatial task but not in the brightness problem. The theoretical implications of these results were discussed.

scholarly journals Elemental and Configural Associative Learning in Spatial Tasks: Could Zebrafish be Used to Advance Our Knowledge?

2020 ◽  
Vol 14 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexis Buatois ◽  
Robert Gerlai
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Learning ◽  
Molecular Mechanisms ◽  
Spatial Task ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Spatial Learning And Memory ◽  
Configural Learning ◽  
Association Learning ◽  
Laboratory Rodents ◽  
Spatial Tasks ◽  
Behavioral Mechanisms

Spatial learning and memory have been studied for several decades. Analyses of these processes pose fundamental scientific questions but are also relevant from a biomedical perspective. The cellular, synaptic and molecular mechanisms underlying spatial learning have been intensively investigated, yet the behavioral mechanisms/strategies in a spatial task still pose unanswered questions. Spatial learning relies upon configural information about cues in the environment. However, each of these cues can also independently form part of an elemental association with the specific spatial position, and thus spatial tasks may be solved using elemental (single CS and US association) learning. Here, we first briefly review what we know about configural learning from studies with rodents. Subsequently, we discuss the pros and cons of employing a relatively novel laboratory organism, the zebrafish in such studies, providing some examples of methods with which both elemental and configural learning may be explored with this species. Last, we speculate about future research directions focusing on how zebrafish may advance our knowledge. We argue that zebrafish strikes a reasonable compromise between system complexity and practical simplicity and that adding this species to the studies with laboratory rodents will allow us to gain a better understanding of both the evolution of and the mechanisms underlying spatial learning. We conclude that zebrafish research will enhance the translational relevance of our findings.

The Effect of Task Difficulty and Criteria of Learning on a Subsequent Reversal

1973 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 223-228 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Sweller
Keyword(s):  
Discrimination Training ◽  
Reversal Learning ◽  
Task Difficulty ◽  
Quadratic Function ◽  
Spatial Task ◽  
Attention Theory ◽  
Reversal Effect ◽  
Initial Discrimination

Two experiments using rats were carried out in which it was shown that a quadratic function can best describe the relation between amount of initial discrimination training and speed of reversal learning for both a difficult visual and an easy spatial task. The results are used to explain the rarity of the over learning reversal effect (ORE) using easy tasks such as position discriminations. Implications for the attention theory are also discussed.

scholarly journals The Role of Gender and Familiarity in a Modified Version of the Almeria Boxes Room Spatial Task

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
pp. 681
Author(s):  
Alessia Bocchi ◽  
Massimiliano Palmiero ◽  
Jose Manuel Cimadevilla Redondo ◽  
Laura Tascón ◽  
Raffaella Nori ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Gender Differences ◽  
Initial Phase ◽  
Spatial Navigation ◽  
Spatial Task ◽  
Individual Factors ◽  
Learning Tasks ◽  
Position Learning ◽  
Spatial Tasks ◽  
Environmental Representation

Individual factors like gender and familiarity can affect the kind of environmental representation that a person acquires during spatial navigation. Men seem to prefer relying on map-like survey representations, while women prefer using sequential route representations. Moreover, a good familiarity with the environment allows more complete environmental representations. This study was aimed at investigating gender differences in two different object-position learning tasks (i.e., Almeria Boxes Tasks) assuming a route or a survey perspective also considering the role of environmental familiarity. Two groups of participants had to learn the position of boxes placed in a virtual room. Participants had several trials, so that familiarity with the environment could increase. In both tasks, the effects of gender and familiarity were found, and only in the route perspective did an interaction effect emerge. This suggests that gender differences can be found regardless of the perspective taken, with men outperforming women in navigational tasks. However, in the route task, gender differences appeared only at the initial phase of learning, when the environment was unexplored, and disappeared when familiarity with the environment increased. This is consistent with studies showing that familiarity can mitigate gender differences in spatial tasks, especially in more complex ones.

scholarly journals Spatial tuning and brain state account for dorsal hippocampal CA1 activity in a non-spatial learning task

eLife ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin Q Shan ◽  
Evgueniy V Lubenov ◽  
Maria Papadopoulou ◽  
Athanassios G Siapas
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Learning ◽  
Pyramidal Neurons ◽  
Spatial Information ◽  
Eyeblink Conditioning ◽  
Brain Area ◽  
Learning Task ◽  
Spatial Task ◽  
Place Cells ◽  
Brain State ◽  
Output Stages

The hippocampus is a brain area crucial for episodic memory in humans. In contrast, studies in rodents have highlighted its role in spatial learning, supported by the discovery of place cells. Efforts to reconcile these views have found neurons in the rodent hippocampus that respond to non-spatial events but have not unequivocally dissociated the spatial and non-spatial influences on these cells. To disentangle these influences, we trained freely moving rats in trace eyeblink conditioning, a hippocampally dependent task in which the animal learns to blink in response to a tone. We show that dorsal CA1 pyramidal neurons are all place cells, and do not respond to the tone when the animal is moving. When the animal is inactive, the apparent tone-evoked responses reflect an arousal-mediated resumption of place-specific firing. These results suggest that one of the main output stages of the hippocampus transmits only spatial information, even in this non-spatial task.

scholarly journals Landmark Discrimination Learning in the Dog

1999 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 54-61 ◽  
Author(s):  
Norton W. Milgram ◽  
Beth Adams ◽  
Heather Callahan ◽  
Elizabeth Head ◽  
Bill Mackay ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Memory ◽  
Task Performance ◽  
Discrimination Learning ◽  
Spatial Learning ◽  
Discrimination Task ◽  
Memory Task ◽  
Spatial Cues ◽  
Spatial Memory Task ◽  
Visual Landmark ◽  
Spatial Tasks

Allocentric spatial memory was studied in dogs of varying ages and sources using a landmark discrimination task. The primary goal of this study was to develop a protocol to test landmark discrimination learning in the dog. Using a modified version of a landmark test developed for use in monkeys, we successfully trained dogs to make a spatial discrimination on the basis of the position of a visual landmark relative to two identical discriminanda. Task performance decreased, however, as the distance between the landmark and the “discriminandum” was increased. A subgroup of these dogs was also tested on a delayed nonmatching to position spatial memory task (DNMP), which relies on egocentric spatial cues. These findings suggest that dogs can acquire both allocentric and egocentric spatial tasks. These data provide a useful tool for evaluating the ability of canines to use allocentric cues in spatial learning.

scholarly journals GRASP-Tabu Search Algorithms for the Route Planning Problem in Spatial Crowdsourcing

2022 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 0-0
Keyword(s):  
Route Planning ◽  
Search Algorithms ◽  
Spatial Task ◽  
Planning Problem ◽  
Limited Time ◽  
Computational Results ◽  
Optimal Route ◽  
Spatial Crowdsourcing ◽  
Spatial Tasks ◽  
Benchmark Instances

With the speedy progress of mobile devices, a lot of commercial enterprises have exploited crowdsourcing as a useful approach to gather information to develop their services. Thus, spatial crowdsourcing has appeared as a new platform in e-commerce and which implies procedures of requesters and workers. A requester submits spatial tasks request to the workers who choose and achieve them during a limited time. Thereafter, the requester pays only the worker for the well accomplished the task. In spatial crowdsourcing, each worker is required to physically move to the place to accomplish the spatial task and each task is linked with location and time. The objective of this article is to find an optimal route to the worker through maximizing her rewards with respecting some constraint, using an approach based on GRASP with Tabu. The proposed algorithm is used in the literature for benchmark instances. Computational results indicate that the proposed and the developed algorithm is competitive with other solution approaches.

scholarly journals Pigeons retain partial memories of homing paths years after learning them individually, collectively or culturally

2021 ◽  
Vol 288 (1963) ◽  
Author(s):  
Julien Collet ◽  
Takao Sasaki ◽  
Dora Biro
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
Release Site ◽  
Spatial Task ◽  
Cultural Learning ◽  
Long Term Memory ◽  
Memory Retention ◽  
The Social ◽  
Spatial Tasks ◽  
A Site

Memory of past experience is central to many animal decisions, but how long specific memories can influence behaviour is poorly understood. Few studies have reported memories retrieved after several years in non-human animals, especially for spatial tasks, and whether the social context during learning could affect long-term memory retention. We investigated homing pigeons' spatial memory by GPS-recording their homing paths from a site 9 km from their loft. We compared solo flights of naive pigeons with those of pigeons that had last homed from this site 3–4 years earlier, having learnt a homing route either alone (individual learning), together with a naive partner (collective learning) or within cultural transmission chains (cultural learning). We used as a control a second release site unfamiliar to all pigeons. Pigeons from all learning treatments outperformed naive birds at the familiar (but not the unfamiliar) site, but the idiosyncratic routes they formerly used several years before were now partially forgotten. Our results show that non-human animals can use their memory to solve a spatial task years after they last performed it, irrespective of the social context during learning. They also suggest that without reinforcement, landmarks and culturally acquired ‘route traditions' are gradually forgotten.

scholarly journals No evidence for cross-contextual consistency in spatial learning and behavioural flexibility in a passerine

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
CA Troisi ◽  
AC Cooke ◽  
GL Davidson ◽  
I de la Hera ◽  
MS Reichert ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Learning ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Animal Studies ◽  
Spatial Scales ◽  
Parus Major ◽  
Spatial Task ◽  
Cognitive Domain ◽  
Behavioural Flexibility ◽  
Reaching Task ◽  
Natural Behaviour

AbstractAlthough the evolution of cognitive differences among species has long been of interest in ecology, whether natural selection acts on cognitive processes within populations has only begun to receive similar attention. One of the key challenges is to understand how consistently cognitive traits within any one domain are expressed over time and across different contexts, as this has direct implications for the way in which selection might act on this variation. Animal studies typically measure a cognitive domain using only one task in one context, and assume that this captures the likely expression of that domain in different contexts. This deficit is not surprising because, from an ecologist’s perspective, cognitive tasks are notoriously laborious to employ, and for design reasons most tasks can only be deployed in a specific context. Thus our knowledge of whether individual differences in cognitive abilities are consistent across contexts is limited. Using a wild population of great tits (Parus major) we characterised consistency of two cognitive abilities, each in two different contexts: 1) spatial learning at two different spatial scales, and 2) behavioural flexibility as both performance in a detour reaching task and reversal learning in a spatial task. We found no evidence of a correlation between the two spatial learning speeds, or between the two measures of behavioural flexibility. This suggests that cognitive performance is highly plastic and sensitive to differences across tasks, or that variants of these well-known tasks may tap into different combinations of both cognitive and non-cognitive mechanisms, or that they simply do not adequately measure each putative cognitive domain. Our results highlight the challenges of developing standardised cognitive assays to explain natural behaviour and to understand the selective consequences of that variation.

scholarly journals Generalizability of implicit spatial learning depends on task difficulty

2015 ◽  
Vol 15 (12) ◽  
pp. 1050
Author(s):  
Bo-Yeong Won ◽  
Andrew Leber
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Learning ◽  
Task Difficulty
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