[Stable syndrome of reinforced food motivation in rabbits].

In freely moving rats, a chronic focus of excitation was created in the initiative centers of food motivation by longterm subthreshold electric stimulation of the lateral hypothalamus (LH). This stimulation resulted in a progressive formation of a syndrome reinforced by food motivation, which was manifested in a significant increase in the number of food motivation instrumental reactions and in putting on weight. Concurrently the rabbits demonstrated an intensification of the orienting-investigative behavior and general locomotor activity. The syndrome induced was not strongly connected with the beginning of the electric stimulation and persisted without weakening for a long time (2--4 weeks) after chronic electric stimulation was discontinued. By the character of development, manifestations and persistence the syndrome overtly differed from other phenomena of hyperphagia which were obtained by other workers during chronic electric stimulation of LH. It is assumed that at the basis of the syndrome there lies a formaton of a longterm generator of excitation in the "pacemaker" of food motivation.