Failure of sodium- and calcium-deficient rats to acquire conditioned taste aversions to the object of their specific hunger.
Attempts were made to condition taste aversions to the objects of two mineral-specific hungers. Both the innate preference of adrenalectomized rats for sodium and the learned preference of parathyroidectomized rats for calcium were studied. None of the sodium-deficient rats poisoned after drinking sodium chloride (NaCl) reached a taste-avoidance criterion, even after nine pairings of salt ingestion with aversive lithium chloride injections. Six of 11 calcium-deficient rats did not meet the salt-avoidance criterion after 10 pairings. Nondeficient control subjects learned to avoid these salt solutions completely after an average of only three such pairings. Besides unmasking a surprising degree of similarity between the learned and innate specific hungers studied, the results clearly demonstrate a powerful influence of physiological need on aversion conditioning.
D000311:Adrenal Glands / Q000502:physiology; D000315:Adrenalectomy; D000818:Animals; D001362:Avoidance Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D002118:Calcium / Q000172:deficiency*; D003216:Conditioning, Operant / Q000502:physiology*; D004327:Drinking Behavior / Q000502:physiology; D005108:Extinction, Psychological; D005518:Food Preferences; D006815:Hunger / Q000502:physiology; D008094:Lithium / Q000506:poisoning; D008297:Male; D010280:Parathyroid Glands / Q000502:physiology / Q000601:surgery; D051381:Rats; D012964:Sodium / Q000172:deficiency*; D013649:Taste / Q000502:physiology*
D008094:Lithium; D012964:Sodium; D002118:Calcium