Giving flesh to a "straw man": A reply to Feeney, Pittman, and Wagner.

Exposure to uncontrollable shock impairs later choice-escape learning in rats. A deficit occurs only when an irrelevant cue is presented on choice trials and the rat is unable to ignore the cue. Three experiments examined the role of stress-induced depletion of forebrain norepinephrine (NE) in the choice-accuracy deficit. Experiments 1 and 2 established a relationship between stressfulness of pretreatment sessions, magnitude of the deficit in later choice escape, and depletion of forebrain NE upon reexposure to a few shocks 24 h after pretreatment. Experiment 3 established that NE depletion is sufficient to impair choice performance. Bilateral 6-hydroxydopamine lesions of the ascending dorsal tegmental bundle mimicked the effects of inescapable shock. Lesioned rats showed a deficit in choice accuracy only when an irrelevant cue was presented during choice testing. Vehic1e controls were unimpaired regardless of cue condition. These data are consistent with the notion that the ascending dorsal tegmental bundle is involved in attentionlike processing and suggest that deficits in stimulus selection following inescapable shock may result from stress-induced depletion of forebrain NE.Although it is weIl established that exposure to inescapable, but not to escapable, eleetric shock impairs later escape performance in rats (Maier, Albin, & Testa, 1973; Seligman, Rosellini, & Kozak, 1975), there is stilliittie agreement concerning the mechanism underlying this effeet. Maier and Seligman (1976) argue that rats learn that their behavior and shock termination during inescapable shock are unrelated, and therefore that responding will be ineffective in producing future outcomes. This expectation of helplessness generalizes to the test task to produce cognitive, motivational, and emotional impairment. Alternatively, deficits in escape performance following inescapable shock could reflect a reduced capacity to respond. Activity deficits could arise from stress-induced depletion ofbrain catecholamines (

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Giving flesh to a "straw man": A reply to Feeney, Pittman, and Wagner.

Cited by 2 publications

References 8 publications

Individual differences in sensation seeking and attentional ability

Individual differences in sensation seeking and attentional ability

Uncontrollable shock, forebrain norepinephrine, and stimulus selection during choice-escape learning

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