Although many drugs act by indirectly stimulating multiple receptors (e.g., reuptake inhibitors), relatively little is known about interactions between agonism at different receptors. This study compared the effect of serotonin (5-HT) 1A receptor agonists with the discriminative stimulus effects of the 5-HT 2A receptor agonist 1-(2,5-dimethoxy-4-methylphenyl)-2-aminopropane (DOM) in rats and rhesus monkeys. Eight rats discriminated 0.56 mg/kg i.p. DOM and responded under a fixed ratio (FR) 10 schedule of food presentation, whereas three rhesus monkeys discriminated 0.32 mg/kg s.c. DOM and responded under an FR 5 schedule of stimulus shock termination. DOM and the 5-HT 2A receptor agonists 2,5-dimethoxy-4-n-propylthiophenethylamine (2C-T-7) and dipropyltryptamine (DPT), but not the 5-HT 1A receptor agonists 8-hydroxy-2-(di-n-propylamino) tetralin hydrochloride (8-OH-DPAT) and 3-chloro-4-fluorophenyl-(4-fluoro-4-([(5-methyl-6-methylaminopyridin-2-ylmethyl) amino) methyl] piperidin-1-yl) methanone (F13714), occasioned responding on the DOM-associated lever in rats and monkeys. Both 8-OH-DPAT and F13714 attenuated the discriminative stimulus effects of DOM in monkeys but not in rats; these effects of 8-OH-DPAT and F13714 were prevented by the 5-. DPT and 2C-T-7 enhanced the discriminative stimulus effects of DOM in rats and monkeys in an additive manner. Taken together, the results suggest that the DOM discriminative stimulus is pharmacologically similar and mediated by 5-HT 2A receptors in rats and monkeys; however, the ability of 5-HT 1A receptor agonists to modify the effects of DOM is markedly different between these species. These results indicate possible differences in the neurobiology of 5-HT systems that could be important for studying drugs that have multiple mechanisms of action (e.g., reuptake inhibitors that indirectly stimulate multiple receptors).Often drugs are used in combination to enhance therapeutic effectiveness and/or reduce unwanted effects. Drugs that are used together often share a common effect (e.g., decrease blood pressure) but through different mechanisms (Oates and Brown, 2001). Other pharmacotherapeutic strategies also involve multiple mechanisms of action, including indirect-acting agonists that indirectly stimulate multiple receptors. For example, by blocking serotonin (5-HT) transport back into neurons, selective 5-HT reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) act as indirect 5-HT receptor agonists, increasing synaptic levels of 5-HT, which acts at multiple 5-HT receptor subtypes. The therapeutic efficacy of SSRIs is well established; however, the role of different 5-HT receptor subtypes in the therapeutic effects of SSRIs and the potential importance of interactions among receptor subtypes are largely unknown.