Implementation of stimuli with millisecond timing accuracy in online experiments.

Online experiments are growing in popularity. This study aimed to determine the timing accuracy of web technologies and investigate whether they can be used to support high temporal precision psychology experiments. A dynamic sinusoidal grating and flashes were produced by setInterval, CSS3, and requestAnimationFrame (hereafter, rAF) technologies. They were run at normal or real-time priority processing in Chrome, Firefox, Edge, and Internet Explorer on Windows, macOS, and Linux. Timing accuracies were compared with that of Psychtoolbox which was chosen as gold standard. It was found that rAF with real-time priority had the best timing accuracy compared to the other web technologies and had a similar timing accuracy as Psychtoolbox in traditional experiments in most cases. However, rAF exhibited poor timing accuracy on Linux. Therefore, rAF can be used as technical basis for accuracy of millisecond timing sequences in online experiments, thereby benefiting the psychology field.

A system for the real-time tracking of operant behavior as an application of 3D camera.

The capacity of 3D cameras to measure many different aspects of behavior (e.g., velocity, pattern, and posture) could contribute to the understanding of behavior. The present article describes a system for the real-time tracking of operant behavior, which is applicable to other domains of behavioral science as well. Methods for real-time 3D tracking of animal behavior are described, along with sample C++ programs. A demonstration using one zebrafish as a subject indicated that the present system successfully tracked the 3D motion of the fish. Moreover, the acquisition of a target response (i.e., approach to a corner of the aquarium) was demonstrated with the arrangement of a reinforcement contingency at the corner in the absence of a traditional, salient operandum. The system offers the capacity to characterize more completely ongoing behavior in learning tasks across a range of species than simply performance of discrete operant responses. The system also is capable of tracking multiple individuals simultaneously so it is possible both to study social interactions and arrange contingencies for engaging in social behavior. Other possible applications of 3D cameras are discussed.

Increased entrances to side compartments indicate incubation of craving in morphine-induced rat and tree shrew CPP models.

In humans, cues associated with the rewarding effect of drugs of abuse induce drug craving and activate drug-associated memories after prolonged abstinence. In animal studies with the self-administration (SA) paradigm, responses to drug-associated cues increase within time after extinction, a phenomenon described as incubation of craving. Conditioned place preference (CPP) is widely used to measure the rewarding effect of drugs and the reward memory thereof. However, little is known whether responses to drug associated cues progressively increase after abstinence from the drugs in the CPP paradigm. To test whether the drug-associated cues could increase specific responses over the abstinence period in the CPP paradigm, we employed the high dose morphine-induced CPP paradigms in rats and tree shrews in the present study. We examined the CPP scores and the entrances to side chambers of the CPP apparatus to check whether they would progressively increase in the CPP paradigms. Twenty-one male adult Sprague-Dawley rats and eight adult male tree shrews were used to establish morphine-induced CPP and another ten rats treated with saline were controls for the rat experiments. After morphine conditioning, rats and tree shrews showed significant higher CPP scores at the first or second post tests than at baseline but then the CPP scores in the abstinence period decreased gradually. During the abstinence period, animals with morphine-conditioning experiences entered progressively more times to both side compartments, whereas the number of entrances to side chambers of the saline group in rats had no such significant differences. These findings suggest that progressively increased entrances to the side chambers in the extended abstinence period reflect the incubation of craving in high dose morphine-induced CPP paradigms. Also, our data imply that reward memory and drug craving can be distinguished in the CPP paradigm.

THE IMPORTANCE OF INSTRUMENT MAKERS FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY: THE CASE OF ALFRED BINET AT THE SORBONNE LABORATORY.

The importance of instrument firms in the development of psychology, and science in general, should not be underestimated since it would not have been possible for various leading psychologists at the turn of the twentieth century to conduct certain experiments without the assistance of instrument makers, as is often the case today. To illustrate the historical perspective introduced here, the example of Alfred Binet is taken, as he is an interesting case of a psychologist working in close collaboration with various French instrument designers of the time. The objective of this article is twofold: (1) to show the considerable activity carried out by early psychologists to finalize new laboratory instruments in order to develop their research projects; (2) to reassess the work of a major figure in French psychology through his activity as a designer of precision instruments. The development of these new instruments would certainly have been difficult without the presence in Paris of numerous precision instrument manufacturers such as Charles Verdin, Otto Lund, Henri Collin, and Lucien Korsten, on whom Binet successively called in order to develop his projects in the field of experimental psychology.

An automated Y-maze based on a reduced instruction set computer (RISC) microcontroller for the assessment of continuous spontaneous alternation in rats.

Continuous spontaneous alternation behavior (SAB) in a Y-maze is used for evaluating working memory in rodents. Here, the design of an automated Y-maze equipped with three infrared optocouplers per arm, and commanded by a reduced instruction set computer (RISC) microcontroller is described. The software was devised for recording only true entries and exits to the arms. Experimental settings are programmed via a keyboard with three buttons and a display. The sequence of arm entries and the time spent in each arm and the neutral zone (NZ) are saved as a text file in a non-volatile memory for later transfer to a USB flash memory. Data files are analyzed with a program developed under LabVIEW® environment, and the results are exported to an Excel® spreadsheet file. Variables measured are: latency to exit the starting arm, sequence and number of arm entries, number of alternations, alternation percentage, and cumulative times spent in each arm and NZ. The automated Y-maze accurately detected the SAB decrease produced in rats by the muscarinic antagonist trihexyphenidyl, and its reversal by caffeine, having 100 % concordance with the alternation percentages calculated by two trained observers who independently watched videos of the same experiments. Although the values of time spent in the arms and NZ measured by the automated system had small discrepancies with those calculated by the observers, Bland-Altman analysis showed 95 % concordance in three pairs of comparisons, while in one it was 90 %, indicating that this system is a reliable and inexpensive alternative for the study of continuous SAB in rodents.

A within-subject between-apparatus comparison of impulsive choice: T-maze and two-lever chamber.

Whereas intertemporal choice procedures are a common method for examining impulsive choice in nonhuman subjects, the apparatus used to implement this procedure varies across studies. The purpose of the present study was to compare impulsive choice between a two-lever chamber and a T-maze. In Experiment 1, rats chose between a smaller, immediate reinforcer and a larger, delayed reinforcer, first in a two-lever chamber and then in a T-maze. Delay to the larger reinforcer changed in an ascending and descending order (0-32 s) across sessions. Experiment 2 examined the same between-apparatus comparison but under steady-state conditions with the delay fixed at 32 s. In Experiment 1, choice for the larger, delayed reinforcer was generally higher in the T-maze than in the two-lever chamber. Similarly in Experiment 2, steady-state choice for the larger, delayed reinforcer was higher in the T-maze. Choice for the 32-s delayed reinforcer was also greater in Experiment 2 than in Experiment 1, suggesting that extended exposure to the delay is required for the T-maze to yield reliable impulsive choice data. While the reasons for the between-apparatus discrepancies are at present unknown, results from both experiments clearly demonstrate that the apparatus matters when assessing overall level and reliability of impulsive choice data.

Screening the psychological laboratory: Hugo Münsterberg, psychotechnics, and the cinema, 1892-1916.

ARGUMENT: According to Hugo Münsterberg, the direct application of experimental psychology to the practical problems of education, law, industry, and art belonged by definition to the domain of psychotechnics. Whether in the form of pedagogical prescription, interrogation technique, hiring practice, or aesthetic principle, the psychotechnical method implied bringing the psychological laboratory to bear on everyday life. There were, however, significant pitfalls to leaving behind the putative purity of the early psychological laboratory in pursuit of technological utility. In the Vocation Bureau, for example, psychological instruments were often deemed too intimidating for a public unfamiliar with the inner workings of experimental science. Similarly, when psychotechnical means were employed by big business in screening job candidates, ethical red flags were raised about this new alliance between science and capital. This tension was particularly evident in Münsterberg's collaboration with the Paramount Pictures Corporation in 1916. In translating psychological tests into short experimental films, Münsterberg not only envisioned a new mass medium for the dissemination of psychotechnics, but a means by which to initiate the masses into the culture of experimental psychology.

A portable system for studying discrete-trial group choice.

Whether groups of people or animals behave optimally in relation to resources is an issue of interest to psychology, ecology, and economics. In behavioral ecology, the simplest model of optimal group choice is the ideal free distribution (IFD). The IFD model has been tested in humans with discrete or continuous inputs and through manual or automated procedures (e.g., Kraft, Baum, & Burge, 2002; Madden, Peden, & Yamagushi, 2002). Manual procedures tend to be time consuming, however, whereas automated procedures typically require access to a computer network. In this article, we describe a new automated system for discrete-trial tests of the IFD model. Our protocol involves a single computer connected to a digital projector (for stimulus presentation) and a network of gamepads (for registering choices). The system is comparatively inexpensive, easy to install, easy to transport, and it permits the automated collection of group data in minimal time. We show that the data generated through this protocol are comparable to those previously reported in the IFD literature.

Low-cost USB interface for operant research using Arduino and Visual Basic.

This note describes the design of a low-cost interface using Arduino microcontroller boards and Visual Basic programming for operant conditioning research. The board executes one program in Arduino programming language that polls the state of the inputs and generates outputs in an operant chamber. This program communicates through a USB port with another program written in Visual Basic 2010 Express Edition running on a laptop, desktop, netbook computer, or even a tablet equipped with Windows operating system. The Visual Basic program controls schedules of reinforcement and records real-time data. A single Arduino board can be used to control a total of 52 inputs/output lines, and multiple Arduino boards can be used to control multiple operant chambers. An external power supply and a series of micro relays are required to control 28-V DC devices commonly used in operant chambers. Instructions for downloading and using the programs to generate simple and concurrent schedules of reinforcement are provided. Testing suggests that the interface is reliable, accurate, and could serve as an inexpensive alternative to commercial equipment.

LE RICERCHE SPERIMENTALI DI ENZO BONAVENTURA SUL TEMPO SICOLOGICO.

The study of the subjective experience of time constitutes a classical research program of experimental psychology developed in many European laboratories during the first half of the twentieth century. Investigations of this kind were conducted also in Italy with research developed during the twenties in the psychological laboratory of the Institute of Higher Studies in Florence. In this context Enzo Bonaventura made an original contribution that was recognized and discussed also on an international level. The present paper would like to illustrate the theoretical methodological approach elaborated, and the results achieved, by this Italian researcher, with particular reference to the experimental techniques and instruments that he designed and created for this purpose. The experimental methodology in the study of the experience of time required the use of particularly precise instruments, by means of which it would be possible to arrive at the measurement and acquisition of quantitative data. In his study of the temporal experience, the Italian psychologist concentrated his attention especially on the presenting in succession of visual or auditory stimuli - all comprised in different comprehensive brief temporal intervals - and on the measure of the perceived temporal experience of time which the subject referred with an introspective act. The tachistoscope was the prince of instruments in this type of research, since it offered the possibility of presenting a visual stimulus for a very brief and measurable time. From the comparison between the classical tachistoscope, widespread in the European laboratories since the time of Wundt, and that modified by Bonaventura, there emerge substantial differences, not only and not so much on account of their diverse capabilities of performance, but especially because of the differences in the theoretical models and investigative objectives underlying such instruments.

The instruments in the first psychological laboratory in Mexico: antecedents, influence, and methods.

Enrique O. Aragón established the first psychological laboratory in Mexico in 1916. This laboratory was inspired by Wundt's laboratory and by those created afterward in Germany and the United States. It was equipped with state-of-the art instruments imported from Germany in 1902 from Ernst Zimmermann who supplied instruments for Wundt's laboratory. Although previous authors have described the social events leading to the creation of the laboratory, there are limited descriptions of the instruments, their use, and their influence. With the aid of archival resources, the initial location of the laboratory was determined. The analysis of instruments revealed a previously overlooked relation with a previous laboratory of experimental physiology. The influence of the laboratory was traced by describing the careers of 4 students, 3 of them women, who worked with the instruments during the first 2 decades of the 20th century, each becoming accomplished scholars. In addition, this article, by identifying and analyzing the instruments shown in photographs of the psychological laboratory and in 1 motion film, provides information of the class demonstrations and the experiments conducted in this laboratory.

Experimental evaluation of tachistoscopic measurement: a step beyond Wundt's criticism.

This study was designed to assess the possible systematic bias in measurements obtained using tachistoscopic devices from different historical periods of psychological research. Four different tachistoscopic devices were used for brief presentations of stimuli in a letter recognition task. The research sample consisted of 24 participants (12 female, 12 male) in a within-subject experimental design with complete counterbalancing of 4 conditions defined by 4 instrument types: fall tachistoscope, tachistoscope with camera-like shutter, and computer-based tachistoscopes with cathode ray tube and liquid crystal diode display screens. The effects of experimental conditions were examined using a linear mixed model analysis. Our experiment demonstrated that even in standardized settings the type of tachistoscope used for stimulus presentation systematically influenced the participants' performance. We found that the lowest number of correctly recalled stimuli, as well as the highest number of erroneously recalled stimuli, was produced in the camera-like tachistoscope condition. Together, these findings suggest that when results from studies involving tachistoscopic experiments are reviewed, the unique characteristics of each particular instrument used must be considered carefully.

Evaluation of the potential of antipsychotic agents to induce catalepsy in rats: assessment of a new, commercially available, semi-automated instrument.

Haloperidol induced catalepsy was determined using the classic bar test and a new MED Associates Catalepsy Test Chamber instrument. The dose that produced an adverse effect in 50% of rats (AED50) for haloperidol was calculated using the instrument data as 0.29 mg/kg. Hand scoring of the video recordings gave AED50 values of 0.30 and 0.31 mg/kg, both well within the 95% CL of the instrument data. Clozapine was also evaluated and catalepsy was not detected up to 40 mg/kg. No significant difference was found between the instrument and hand scoring data. The instrument was useful for testing haloperidol and clozapine, relieving much of the tedium and variability experienced without its use. It was especially valuable at measuring shorter time periods, where the researcher cannot react as quickly. Finally, olanzapine was also evaluated. However, clenched forepaws and hind paws prevented the use of the instrument alone at higher doses. A backup stopwatch was used for the bar test in these cases. Some of the advantages and limitations are discussed. Results are also compared to the crossed-legs position (CLP) test for all three antipsychotics. While haloperidol gave similar results at all concentrations tested, clozapine deviated significantly at the highest dose (40 mg/kg) displaying catalepsy in the CLP test but not in the bar test. Olanzapine displayed catalepsy in rats significantly different from vehicle at 40 mg/kg in both the bar and CLP tests. However, the CLP test may be more suited to compounds with gripping problems which prevent the consistent grasping of the bar. Overall, the instrument was found to be a useful aid in conducting the bar test for catalepsy. The CLP test was found to complement the bar test under certain conditions and could provide additional data that might be missed by the bar test for compounds producing grasping problems.

Shallow water (paddling) variants of water maze tests in mice.

When Richard Morris devised his water maze in 1981(7), most behavioral work was done in rats. However, the greater understanding of mouse genetics led to the mouse becoming increasingly important. But researchers found that some strains of mutant mice were prone to problems like passively floating or diving when they were tested in the Morris water maze(11). This was unsurprising considering their natural habitat; rats swim naturally (classically, the "sewer rat"), whereas mice evolved in the dry areas of central Asia. To overcome these problems, it was considered whether shallow water would be a sufficient stimulus to provide escape motivation for mice. This would also avoid the problems of drying the small creatures with a towel and then putting them in a heated recovery chamber to avoid hypothermia, which is a much more serious problem than with rats; the large ratio of surface area to volume of a mouse makes it particularly vulnerable to rapid heat loss. Another consideration was whether a more natural escape strategy could be used, to facilitate learning. Since animals that fall into water and swim away from the safety of the shore are unlikely to pass on their genes, animals have evolved a natural tendency to swim to the edge of a body of water. The Morris water maze, however, requires them to swim to a hidden platform towards the center of the maze - exactly opposite to their evolved behavior. Therefore the paddling maze should incorporate escape to the edge of the apparatus. This feature, coupled with the use of relatively non-aversive shallow water, embodies the "Refinement" aspect of the "3 Rs" of Russell and Burch(8). Various types of maze design were tried; the common feature was that the water was always shallow (2 cm deep) and escape was via a tube piercing the transparent wall of the apparatus. Other tubes ("false exits") were also placed around the walls but these were blocked off. From the inside of the maze all false exits and the single true exit looked the same. Currently a dodecagonal (12-sided) maze is in use in Oxford, with 12 true/false exits set in the corners. In a recent development a transparent paddling Y-maze has been tested successfully.

A visual object naming task standardized for the Croatian language: a tool for research and clinical practice.

The aim of the present study was to provide normative data for the Croatian language using 346 visually presented objects (Cycowicz, Friedman, Rothstein, & Snodgrass Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 65:171-237, 1997; Roach, Schwartz, Martin, Grewal, & Brecher Clinical Aphasiology 24:121-133, 1996; Snodgrass & Vanderwart Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Learning and Memory 6:174-215, 1980). Picture naming was standardized according to seven variables: naming latency, name agreement, familiarity, visual complexity, word length, number of syllables, and word frequency. The descriptive statistics and correlation pattern of the variables collected in the present study were consistent with normative studies in other languages. These normative data for pictorial stimuli named by young healthy Croatian native speakers will be useful in studies of perception, language, and memory, as well as for preoperative and intraoperative mapping of speech and language brain areas.

Prime-, stress-, and cue-induced reinstatement of extinguished drug-reinforced responding in rats: cocaine as the prototypical drug of abuse.

This unit describes the testing of rats in prime-, footshock-, and cue-induced reinstatement procedures. Evaluating rats in these procedures enables the assessment of treatments on behavior thought to model drug relapse precipitated by re-contact with an abused drug (prime-induced), induced by stress (footshock-induced), or by stimuli previously associated with drug administration (cue-induced). For instance, levels of reinstatement under the effects of test compound administration could be compared to levels under vehicle administration to help identify potential treatments for drug relapse, or reinstatement levels of different rat strains could be compared to identify potential genetic determinants of perseverative drug-seeking behavior. Cocaine is used as a prototypical drug of abuse, and relapse to its use serves as the model in this unit, but other self-administered drugs could readily be substituted with little modification to the procedures.

Development and validation of an automated system for detection and assessment of scratching in the rodent.

Pruritus, the sensation of itch, which evokes reflex scratching behavior, has a diverse etiology. Because of its clinical significance, mechanisms of pruriception are an important topic. In the present work we describe and validate a paw motion detector (PMD) system. The system employs a small removable metal band placed on one hind paw that provides a signal indicative of paw movement through perturbation of an electromagnetic (EM) field. C57Bl/6 mice were fitted with a unilateral hind paw band and adapted to testing cylinders equipped with EM signal emission and detection. The following observations were made: (1) in mice, unilateral SQ injection of 48/80 into the dorsolateral aspect of the neck evoked periodic high frequency bursts of scratching at the injected site with the ipsilateral (banded) but not the contralateral (not banded) hind paw. (2) Cross correlation between PMD and human observer counts after SQ 48/80 using the specified computational algorithm revealed a highly significant correlation. (3) SQ histamine and 48/80 over a 1hour interval produced dose dependent scratching, which diphenhydramine dose dependently reversed. Chloroquine scratching displayed an inverse u-shaped dose response curve, which was insensitive to diphenhydramine. (4) SQ 48/80 at intervals over 28 days showed no change in the scratching response within the same cohort of mice. (5) Power analysis showed 40% changes in scratching activity could be detected at the p<0.05 level with groups of 4 mice. These observations indicate that the system described can efficiently define the actions and pharmacology of pruritogenic agents.

A missing link in the evolution of the cumulative recorder.

A recently recovered cumulative recorder provides a missing link in the evolution of the cumulative recorder from a modified kymograph to a reliably operating, scientifically and commercially successful instrument. The recorder, the only physical evidence of such an early precommercial cumulative recorder yet found, was sent to Keio University in Tokyo, Japan, in 1952 at the behest of B. F. Skinner at Harvard University. Last used in research in the late 1960s, the cumulative recorder remained locked in a storage room until 2007, when it was found again. A historical context for the recorder is followed by a description of the recorder and a comparison between it and the commercially successful Gerbrands Model C-1 recorder. Labeled the Keio recorder, it is a testament to Skinner's persistence in developing a reliable means of quantifying the behavior of living organisms in real time.

A new behavioural apparatus to reduce animal numbers in multiple types of spontaneous object recognition paradigms in rats.

Standard object recognition procedures assess animals' memory through their spontaneous exploration of novel objects or novel configurations of objects with other aspects of their environment. Such tasks are widely used in memory research, but also in pharmaceutical companies screening new drug treatments. However, behaviour in these tasks may be driven by influences other than novelty such as stress from handling which can subsequently influence performance. This extra-experimental variance means that large numbers of animals are required to maintain power. In addition, accumulation of data is time consuming as animals typically perform only one trial per day. The present study aimed to explore how effectively recognition memory could be tested with a new continual trials apparatus which allows for multiple trials within a session and reduced handling stress through combining features of delayed nonmatching-to-sample and spontaneous object recognition tasks. In this apparatus Lister hooded rats displayed performance significantly above chance levels in object recognition tasks (Experiments 1 and 2) and in tasks of object-location (Experiment 3) and object-in-context memory (Experiment 4) with data from only five animals or fewer per experimental group. The findings indicated that the results were comparable to those of previous reports in the literature and maintained statistical power whilst using less than a third of the number of animals typically used in spontaneous recognition paradigms. Overall, the results highlight the potential benefit of the continual trials apparatus to reduce the number of animals used in recognition memory tasks.

The Multi-Stimulus Box: an innovative learning device for the comparative study of object perception and recognition with various types of stimuli.

In this article, we report the construction of a novel type of automated learning device for exploring a broad range of issues in animal visual cognition. The testing box (Multi-Stimulus Box, or MSB) we describe is an experimental chamber that enables the flexible presentation of various stimulus types while providing control over incidental cues to the greatest possible extent. Among the stimuli that can be presented are photographs, real objects, and even holograms. The MSB allows for comparative research across different stimulus qualities and species, and is thus a promising tool for advancing our understanding of the role of stimulus qualities for animals' perception, discrimination, and categorization of objects.