Spatial learning deficits in old rats: a model for memory decline in the aged.

Spatial learning tasks are sensitive to functional decline in aged laboratory rodents. This is a review of recent work that has examined both the nature of age-related impairments on spatial tasks, and the relation of such deficits to underlying neurobiological mechanisms. The review supports the notion that hippocampal dysfunction underlies the mild/moderate cognitive decline that often accompanies normal aging. Thus the spatial learning deficit in aged rodents is a promising model for understanding the effect of age on brain systems that serve a memory function in humans.