Behavioral Pharmacology Group, Laboratory of Animal Morphology and Pathology, State University of North Fluminense Darcy Ribeiro, Avenida Alberto Lamego, 2000, Campos dos Goytacazes 28013-602, RJ, Brazil.
Department of Entomology and Plant Pathology, State University of North Fluminense Darcy Ribeiro, Campos dos Goytacazes, RJ, Brazil.
J Neurosci Methods. 2024 Apr;404:110072. doi: 10.1016/j.jneumeth.2024.110072. Epub 2024 Feb 1.
A progressive decrease in spontaneous locomotion with repeated exposure to a novel environment has been assessed using both within and between-session measures. While both are well-established and reliable measurements, neither are useful alone as methods to concurrently assess treatment effects on acquisition and retention of habituation.
We report a behavioral method that measures habituation by combining the within and between measurements of locomotion. We used a 30 min session divided into 6 five min blocks. In the first novel environment session activity was maximal in the first 5 min block but was reduced to a low level by the sixth block, indicative of within-session habituation. Using 8 daily sessions, we showed that this terminal block low level of activity progressed incrementally to the first block to achieve complete habituation.
RESULTS/COMPARISON WITH EXISTING METHODS: Within-session activity across sessions was used to identify different stages of between session habituation. It was then possible to assess drug treatment effects from partial to complete habituation, so that treatment effects on retention of the previously acquired partial habituation, expressed as a reversion to an earlier within session habituation pattern (retrograde amnesia assessment), as well as the effects on new learning by the failure in subsequent sessions to acquire complete between-session habituation (anterograde amnesia assessment).
The use of spontaneous motor activity to assess learning and memory effects provides the opportunity to assess direct treatment effects on behavior and motor activity in contrast to many learning and memory models.
在重复暴露于新环境的情况下，通过使用内程和间程测量，评估了自发运动的逐渐减少。虽然这两种方法都是成熟且可靠的测量方法，但单独使用时，它们都不能同时评估治疗对获得和保持习惯化的影响。
我们报告了一种行为方法，通过将内程和间程运动测量相结合来测量习惯化。我们使用了 30 分钟的实验时段，分为 6 个 5 分钟的块。在第一个新环境的实验中，前 5 分钟块的活动最大，但到第 6 个块时减少到低水平，这表明存在内程习惯化。通过 8 天的实验，我们表明，这种终端块的低活动水平逐渐增加到第一个块，从而实现完全习惯化。
结果/与现有方法的比较：在整个实验过程中，内程活动被用来识别间程习惯化的不同阶段。然后可以评估从部分到完全习惯化的药物治疗效果，从而评估治疗对以前获得的部分习惯化的保留的影响，表现为恢复到较早的内程习惯化模式（逆行性遗忘评估），以及在随后的实验中无法获得完全的间程习惯化（顺行性遗忘评估）而导致新的学习失败的影响。
使用自发运动活动来评估学习和记忆效果提供了机会，可以评估直接的治疗效果对行为和运动活动的影响，而不是许多学习和记忆模型。
