The effects of unilateral and bilateral medial thalamic lesions on discrimination learning in the rat

Abstract

Rats with bilateral medial thalamic lesions, unilateral medial thalamic lesions, and sham operations were tested on acquisition of a visual-tactile, compound stimulus, maze discrimination task. The animals with bilateral lesions were found to be deficient relative to the animals with either unilateral lesions or sham operations, while the latter two groups were not found to differ from each other.

A comparison of the effects of medial frontal, dorsomedial thalamic, and combination lesions on discrimination and spontaneous alternation in the rat

“…Thus, maze activity proved to be an insensitive behavioral assay, not differentiating the groups. (Means, Huntley, Anderson, & Harrell, 1973;Waring & Means, 1976), while animals with unilateral DMT lesions have been found to be unimpaired (Means, Clark, & King, 1976). To our knowledge, rats with lesions restricted to the medial frontal cortex have not been tested on a visual-tactile discrimination.…”