Alcohol Consumption during Adulthood Does Not Impair Later Go/No-Go Reversal Learning in Male Rats
Reversal learning tasks are used to model flexible decision-making in laboratory animals, and exposure to drugs of abuse can cause long-term impairments in reversal learning. However, the long-term effects of alcohol on reversal learning have varied. We evaluated whether six weeks of voluntary alcoh...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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MDPI AG
2021-05-01
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| Series: | NeuroSci |
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| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2673-4087/2/2/12 |
| _version_ | 1797534182694453248 |
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| author | Charles L. Pickens Mark Gallo Hayley Fisher Alisa Pajser Madelyn H. Ray |
| author_facet | Charles L. Pickens Mark Gallo Hayley Fisher Alisa Pajser Madelyn H. Ray |
| author_sort | Charles L. Pickens |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Reversal learning tasks are used to model flexible decision-making in laboratory animals, and exposure to drugs of abuse can cause long-term impairments in reversal learning. However, the long-term effects of alcohol on reversal learning have varied. We evaluated whether six weeks of voluntary alcohol consumption through chronic intermittent alcohol access (elevated by food restriction) in adult male rats would impair rats in a go/no-go reversal learning task when tested at an interval beyond acute withdrawal. In our go/no-go task, rats were reinforced for pressing one lever or withholding from pressing another lever, and the identities of the two levers were switched twice (once rats reached an accuracy criterion). We found no evidence that prior alcohol consumption altered discrimination or reversal learning in our task. This replicates previous patterns from our laboratory that higher alcohol consumption in food-restricted rats did not impair discrimination or reversal learning in a different go/no-go task and that alcohol consumption in free-fed adolescent/early adult rats did not impair go/no-go discrimination or reversal learning in the same task. It is unclear whether this represents an insensitivity of this task to alcohol exposure generally or whether an alcohol exposure procedure that leads to higher blood ethanol concentration (BEC) levels would impair learning. More research is needed to investigate these possibilities. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-10T11:25:59Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-8b4fa98da51749b7981fa3fc05945f79 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2673-4087 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-10T11:25:59Z |
| publishDate | 2021-05-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
| record_format | Article |
| series | NeuroSci |
| spelling | doaj.art-8b4fa98da51749b7981fa3fc05945f792023-11-21T19:39:50ZengMDPI AGNeuroSci2673-40872021-05-012216617610.3390/neurosci2020012Alcohol Consumption during Adulthood Does Not Impair Later Go/No-Go Reversal Learning in Male RatsCharles L. Pickens0Mark Gallo1Hayley Fisher2Alisa Pajser3Madelyn H. Ray4Department of Psychological Sciences, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS 66502, USADepartment of Psychological Sciences, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS 66502, USADepartment of Psychological Sciences, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS 66502, USADepartment of Psychological Sciences, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS 66502, USADepartment of Psychological Sciences, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS 66502, USAReversal learning tasks are used to model flexible decision-making in laboratory animals, and exposure to drugs of abuse can cause long-term impairments in reversal learning. However, the long-term effects of alcohol on reversal learning have varied. We evaluated whether six weeks of voluntary alcohol consumption through chronic intermittent alcohol access (elevated by food restriction) in adult male rats would impair rats in a go/no-go reversal learning task when tested at an interval beyond acute withdrawal. In our go/no-go task, rats were reinforced for pressing one lever or withholding from pressing another lever, and the identities of the two levers were switched twice (once rats reached an accuracy criterion). We found no evidence that prior alcohol consumption altered discrimination or reversal learning in our task. This replicates previous patterns from our laboratory that higher alcohol consumption in food-restricted rats did not impair discrimination or reversal learning in a different go/no-go task and that alcohol consumption in free-fed adolescent/early adult rats did not impair go/no-go discrimination or reversal learning in the same task. It is unclear whether this represents an insensitivity of this task to alcohol exposure generally or whether an alcohol exposure procedure that leads to higher blood ethanol concentration (BEC) levels would impair learning. More research is needed to investigate these possibilities.https://www.mdpi.com/2673-4087/2/2/12alcoholwithdrawalreversal learninglearning and memory |
| spellingShingle | Charles L. Pickens Mark Gallo Hayley Fisher Alisa Pajser Madelyn H. Ray Alcohol Consumption during Adulthood Does Not Impair Later Go/No-Go Reversal Learning in Male Rats NeuroSci alcohol withdrawal reversal learning learning and memory |
| title | Alcohol Consumption during Adulthood Does Not Impair Later Go/No-Go Reversal Learning in Male Rats |
| title_full | Alcohol Consumption during Adulthood Does Not Impair Later Go/No-Go Reversal Learning in Male Rats |
| title_fullStr | Alcohol Consumption during Adulthood Does Not Impair Later Go/No-Go Reversal Learning in Male Rats |
| title_full_unstemmed | Alcohol Consumption during Adulthood Does Not Impair Later Go/No-Go Reversal Learning in Male Rats |
| title_short | Alcohol Consumption during Adulthood Does Not Impair Later Go/No-Go Reversal Learning in Male Rats |
| title_sort | alcohol consumption during adulthood does not impair later go no go reversal learning in male rats |
| topic | alcohol withdrawal reversal learning learning and memory |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2673-4087/2/2/12 |
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