Acquisition and retention of an avoidance response by rats of different ages.
Rats, 21, 120, and 480 days of age, were given acquisition training in a 1-way avoidance task and tested for retention of the response 1 and 30 days later. Whereas the 480-day-old rats showed poorer performance during acquisition, the 21-day-old rats showed the greatest impairment of long term retention. The results suggest that age differences in performance are due to intrinsic maturational processes.
D000367:Age Factors; D000818:Animals; D001143:Arousal / Q000502:physiology; D001341:Autonomic Nervous System / Q000502:physiology; D001362:Avoidance Learning / Q000502:physiology; D003216:Conditioning, Operant; D008297:Male; D008568:Memory; D051381:Rats; D011930:Reaction Time; D012153:Retention, Psychology; D013997:Time Factors