Influence of enucleation upon two-way avoidance behavior of rats, hamsters, chinchillas and BALB/cJ mice.

Several rodent species were blinded and their two-way avoidance behavior was compared to unoperated controls. Blindness facilitated avoidance learning in BALB/cJ mice, impaired learning in hamsters and had no significant effect on albino rats, hooded rats and chinchillas. Effects of blindness upon intertrial locomotor activity correlated well with effects of blindness upon avoidance learning. Preventing intertrial activity abolished the effect of blindness in mice, and did not change performance of blind albino rats.