Effects of cholinergic stimulation of the caudate nucleus on active avoidance.

Experiments dealing with the effects of applications of cholinergic drugs into the caudate nucleus on learned behaviors have yielded contradictory results; both improvements and deficits have been found. In the present experiment choline was injected into the CN of rats previously trained in a two-way active avoidance task. The results show that an improvement in performance can be seen when a small dose of choline is used and suggest that the reported deficits in learned performance were due to an overactivation of acetylcholine receptors.