Lin Tzu-Ching E, Honey Robert C
School of Psychology, Cardiff University, Wales, United Kingdom.
J Exp Psychol Anim Behav Process. 2011 Jul;37(3):317-29. doi: 10.1037/a0022497.
Within-subjects procedures with rats assessed the associative structures acquired during conditioning trials in which the interval between the stimuli and food was either short or long (i.e., A-10 s→food and B-40 s→food). In Experiments 1 and 2, after these conditioning trials, A and B served as second-order reinforcers for 2 further stimuli (i.e., X→A and Y→B); whereas Experiment 3 used a sensory preconditioning procedure in which X→A and Y→B trials occurred before the conditioning trials, and rats were finally tested with X and Y. In each experiment, Y elicited greater responding at test than did X. This finding supports the contention that the long-lived trace of B (associated with food on B-40 s→food trials) is more similar to the memory of B that was associatively provoked by Y, than is the short-lived trace of A (associated with food on A-10 s→food trials) to the memory of A that was associatively provoked by X. These conclusions were reinforced by the effects of a neural manipulation that disrupted discrimination learning involving the short traces of stimuli but not the long traces of the same stimuli.
对大鼠进行的组内程序评估了在条件性试验期间获得的联想结构，在这些试验中，刺激与食物之间的间隔要么短要么长（即，A - 10秒→食物和B - 40秒→食物）。在实验1和实验2中，在这些条件性试验之后，A和B作为另外两种刺激（即，X→A和Y→B）的二级强化物；而实验3使用了一种感觉预条件作用程序，其中X→A和Y→B试验在条件性试验之前进行，并且最终用X和Y对大鼠进行测试。在每个实验中，Y在测试时比X引发了更强的反应。这一发现支持了这样的论点，即B的长时痕迹（与B - 40秒→食物试验中的食物相关联）比A的短时痕迹（与A - 10秒→食物试验中的食物相关联）更类似于由Y联想引发的B的记忆，而A的短时痕迹比由X联想引发的A的记忆更类似于由Y联想引发的B的记忆。一种神经操作的效果强化了这些结论，该神经操作破坏了涉及刺激短时痕迹的辨别学习，但没有破坏相同刺激的长时痕迹。
