Effects of extended context discrimination training and context extinction on transfer of context dependency of conditioned flavor aversion.

ABSTRACT

We trained rats in a context discrimination paradigm by pairing a sucrose solution with lithium chloride in one context (conditioning context) and simple exposure to the same fluid in a second (neutral) context to establish a context-dependent aversion to the conditioned fluid. We then investigated whether transfer of the context dependency to a test fluid (a sodium chloride solution) was affected by two post-discrimination training treatments, an extended context discrimination training, and non-reinforced exposure to the conditioning context (context extinction). We found that the context-dependent flavor aversion that had been specific to sucrose transferred to the test fluid after the extensive training (Experiment 1). Context extinction eliminated the transfer effect that had been observed immediately after the context discrimination training (Experiment 2). In addition, an aversion acquired by sucrose through a simple conditioning of sucrose-LiCl pairings did not generalize to the test fluid (Experiment 3). These results emphasize the importance of a Pavlovian excitatory association between the conditioning context and nausea as a primary source of transfer of the context dependency, rather than a generalization of aversion acquired by the conditioned fluid to the test fluid.