Scopolamine in rats impairs acquisition but not retention in a 14-unit T-maze.

To follow up a previous report noting that scopolamine impaired acquisition performance of young rats in a shock-motivated 14-unit T-maze, the present study assessed the effects of muscarinic antagonism on retention aspects of the same task. The broader objective was to further the investigation of possible defects in cholinergic neurotransmission that might underlie the age-related impairments previously observed in this task. Young (3-month) male F-344 rats were given preliminary training to criterion in one-way active avoidance in a straight runway. Then on the first day of complex maze training, each rat received 5 acquisition (AQ) trials followed by a second 10-trial retention (RET) session conducted the following day. Subjects were assigned to one of eight groups receiving an intraperitoneal injection of either scopolamine hydrochloride (1.0 mg/kg) or saline as follows: (a) 30 min prior to training on the first day (PRE-AQ); (b) 30 min prior to training on both the first and second day (PRE-AQ-RET); (c) immediately after completing the trial on the first day (POST-AQ); (d) 30 min prior to testing on the second day (PRE-RET). Dependent measures included errors, alternation errors, run time, number of shocks, and total shock received. On the first day of maze training, all performance measures except for alternation errors were significantly higher for the two acquisition groups (PRE-AQ and PRE-AQ-RET) compared to all other groups which did not differ significantly.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)