Toxicosis-mediated potentiation occurs in a taste/taste compound.

Abstract

The phenomenon known as taste-mediated potentiation is typically defined as an enhanced conditioned aversion to a target element of a compound CS relative to that element conditioned singly. Many of the initial potentiation studies examined the associations of compounds consisting of a taste and a non-taste element such as a visual cue (Galef & Osbborne, 1978), color cue (Lett, 1980), auditory stimuli (Ellins, Cramer, & Whitmore, 1985), environmental element (Best, Brown, & Sowell, 1984) or odor (Durlach & Rescorla, 1980). This phenomenon has not been so apparent when the compound CS has consisted of two tastes (Bouton & Whiting, 1982). However, recently Bouton, Dunlap, and Swartzentruber (1987) have reported successful potentiation of a taste by another taste. In the present two studies a taste-taste compound CS, comprised of denatonium saccharide and saccharin, was presented to rats prior to lithium chloride-induced toxicosis. It is evident from both experiments that these two tastes can form an effective compound CS. While a preexp08ure phase was conducted in Experiment 1, this phase was omitted in Experiment 2 to address the concern that the association interpreted as potentiation may have been formed during Preexposure and not during Conditioning. As the results of Experiment 2 mirrored those of Experiment 1, the enhanced aversion (i.e., potentiation) to the saccharin was a result of the association formed between the compound (denatonium + saccharin) and the lithium chloride-induced illness on Conditioning.