When a rat thinks he smells a rat, he lets the experimenter know: an expanded study of the effects of odor on runway performance in rats

Abstract

A three-phase experiment was conducted throughout which rats received a double-alternation schedule of reward and nonreward. During Phase 1, the baseline period, double-alternation behavior (patterning) developed in all three measures. During Phase 2, a subject-rotation procedure was initiated. Each day, the last subject in the previous day's running sequence was moved to the first position. The results showed that shifting a subject to the first position disrupted that subject's patterning in all measures. During Phase 3, two naive rats were inserted at the beginning of the squad, and two additional naive rats were inserted at the end of the squad. The results showed that the naive animals placed at the end of the squad acquired patterning more quickly than the animals at the beginning.positions.