Influence of neonatal injections of alpha-MSH on learning, memory and attention in rats.
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We previously observed that 5 months old serotonin 1B receptor knockout (5-HT1BKO) mice exhibited a facilitation of learning in a long-term spatial memory task in a water maze. In this study, we attempted to assess whether this effect might persist during aging. We compared the performances of young-adult (3 months old) and aged (22 months old) 5-HT1BKO and wild type (WT) mice in the same task. Young-adult and aged KO mice exhibited facilitated acquisition of the reference memory task as compared to their respective WT controls. Generally, the performance of aged KO was similar to that of young-adult WT on the parameters defining performance and motor (swim speed) aspects of the task. During probe trials, all mice presented a spatial selectivity, which was, however, less pronounced in aged than in young-adult WT. No such age-related effect was observed in KO mice. In a massed spatial learning task, aged KO and WT mice globally exhibited the same level of performance. Nevertheless, young-adult and aged KO mice were superior to their WT controls as concerns the working memory component of the task. The data suggest that 5-HT1BKO mice are more resistant than WT to age-related memory decline as concerns both reference/long-term and working/short-term spatial memory.
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Studies have shown that young children with autism are not impaired on prefrontal tasks relative to what would be expected for their mental age, raising questions about the executive dysfunction hypothesis of autism. These studies did not include ventromedial prefrontal tasks, however. The present study examined whether young children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are impaired on ventromedial prefrontal tasks, and whether performance on such tasks is correlated with a core autism symptom, joint attention ability. Seventy-two 3- to 4-year-old children with ASD, 34 3- to 4-year-old developmentally delayed children, and 39 12- to 46-month-old typically developing children, matched on mental age, were administered ventromedial and dorsolateral prefrontal tasks and joint attention tasks. Children with ASD performed similarly to comparison groups on all executive function tasks, indicating that at this early age, there is no autism-specific pattern of executive dysfunction. Ventromedial, but not dorsolateral, prefrontal task performance was strongly correlated with joint attention ability, however. The ventromedial prefrontal cortex is hypothesized to play a role in the development of joint attention and possibly some aspects of the autistic syndrome.
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Adult rats with bilateral lesions of the caudate nucleus were treated with GM1 ganglioside. Although animals injected with a control solution were severely impaired in their ability to learn a complex spatial task, those treated with ganglioside were able to learn spatial reversals.
The interpretation of learning and memory deficits in transgenic mice has largely involved theories of NMDA receptor and/or hippocampal function. However, there is little empirical data that describes what NMDA receptors or the hippocampus do in mice. This research assessed the effects of different doses of the NMDA receptor antagonist, MK-801, or different-sized hippocampal lesions on several behavioral parameters in adult male C57Bl/6 mice. In the first set of experiments, different doses of MK-801 (0.05-0.3mg/kg, s.c.) were assayed in fear conditioning, shock sensitivity, locomotion, anxiety, and position habit reversal tests. Contextual and cued fear conditioning, and position habit reversal were impaired in a dose-dependent manner. Locomotor activity was increased immediately after injection of the highest dose of MK-801. A second set of experiments determined the behavioral effects of a moderate and large excitotoxic hippocampal lesion. Both lesions impaired contextual conditioning, while the larger lesion interfered with cued conditioning. Reversal learning was significantly diminished by the large lesion, while the moderate lesion had a detrimental effect at a trend level (P<0.10). These results provide important reference data for studies involving genetic manipulations of NMDA receptor or hippocampal function in mice. Furthermore, they serve as a basis for a non-transgenic mouse model of the NMDA receptor or hippocampal dysfunction hypothesized to occur in human cognitive disorders.
A group of patients with damage to the ventral part of the frontal lobes was severely impaired relative to a group of patients without damage in this area (the non-ventral group) in the reversal and in the extinction of simple visual discrimination tests. In these tests they continued to make responses to a previously rewarded stimulus. Patients often reported verbally that the contingencies had changed, but were unable to alter their behaviour appropriately. These impairments occurred independently of IQ or verbal memory impairments. The perseverative touching of a previously rewarded stimulus is consistent with work with non-human primates showing impaired reversal and extinction after orbitofrontal lesions. Performance on these reversal and extinction tests was highly correlated with scores obtained on a behaviour questionnaire, which reflected the degree of disinhibited and socially inappropriate behaviour exhibited by patients. It is suggested that a difficulty in modifying responses, especially when followed by negative consequences, as manifested in these simple laboratory tests, may contribute to the inappropriate behaviour shown in daily life by patients with frontal lobe damage.
We investigated if task switching affects late response processes that occur after the selection of a response. Subjects performed a sequence of two responses. The first and second response were selected, and then executed in close succession. The interresponse interval (IRI) was taken as a measure of late response processes. The two responses could either belong to different tasks (task-switch condition), or to the same task that was performed twice (task-repetition condition). In all three experiments, the IRI was found to be longer in the task-switch condition than in the task-repetition condition, consistent with the idea that task switching affected late response processes. However, the effects of the manipulation of the stimulus-onset asynchrony revealed that the tendency to perform the two responses as a sequence was reduced in the task-switch condition relative to the task-repetition condition. Thus, the data do not provide unequivocal evidence for task switching affecting late response processes. The data show, however, that task switching affected action sequencing. Two actions that do not belong to the same task context are less likely to be performed as an action sequence. We suggest that task switching interacts with higher-order control processes that cannot be studied within the traditional task-switching paradigm.
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