Duncan H J, Beauchamp G K, Yamazaki K
Monell Chemical Senses Center, Philadelphia, PA 19104-3308.
Physiol Behav. 1992 Sep;52(3):617-20. doi: 10.1016/0031-9384(92)90357-8.
In investigating the ability of the rat to discriminate among urine odors from mice of different genetic strains, we developed a technique for determining the extent of odor generalization. Trained rats performed a discrete trial, go/no-go procedure, touching a bar in the presence of an S+ odor for water reward. Rats easily learned this task and restricted their responding to trials with the S+ stimulus, even though there was no penalty for responding to S-. However, when presented with test stimuli that might be more similar to S+ or S-, some rats responded only to the S+, and not at all to S- or any generalization stimuli. We then created series of stimuli composed of different levels of adulteration of the S+ stimulus with generalization stimuli. With these stimuli, rats produced graded levels of responding, allowing comparisons of similarity among odorant stimuli. This technique can be applied to other types of odorant stimuli, particularly biological compounds of unknown concentration or purity, and should be of use in an operant laboratory studying odorant perception, or odorant characteristics.
在研究大鼠区分不同基因品系小鼠尿液气味的能力时，我们开发了一种确定气味泛化程度的技术。经过训练的大鼠执行离散试验、去/不去程序，在存在S+气味时触碰横杆以获取水奖励。大鼠很容易学会这项任务，并将它们的反应限制在有S+刺激的试验中，即使对S-做出反应没有惩罚。然而，当呈现可能与S+或S-更相似的测试刺激时，一些大鼠只对S+做出反应，而对S-或任何泛化刺激完全不反应。然后，我们创建了一系列由不同程度的S+刺激与泛化刺激掺假组成的刺激。有了这些刺激，大鼠产生了分级的反应水平，从而可以比较气味刺激之间的相似性。这种技术可以应用于其他类型的气味刺激，特别是浓度或纯度未知的生物化合物，并且应该在研究气味感知或气味特征的操作性实验室中有用。
