title: Contextual control of inhibition with reinforcement: adaptation and timing mechanisms.
abstract: Four experiments with rats studied the effects of switching the context after Pavlovian conditioning. In three conditioned suppression experiments, a large number of conditioning trials created "inhibition with reinforcement" (IWR), in which fear of the conditional stimulus (CS) reached a maximum and then declined despite continued CS-unconditional stimulus pairings. When IWR occurred, a context switch augmented fear of the CS; IWR and augmentation were highly correlated. Neither IWR nor augmentation resulted from inhibition of delay (IOD): In conditioned suppression, IWR and augmentation occurred without IOD (Experiment 3), and in appetitive conditioning (Experiment 4), IOD occurred without IWR or augmentation. IWR may occur in conditioned suppression because the animal adapts to fear of the CS in a context-specific manner. The authors discuss several implications.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Vermont, Burlington, VT 05405, USA. mark.bouton@uvm.edu
authors.forename: Mark E
authors.initials: ME
authors.lastname: Bouton
authors.forename: Russell J
authors.initials: RJ
authors.lastname: Frohardt
authors.forename: Ceyhun
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Sunsay
authors.forename: Jaylyn
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Waddell
authors.forename: Richard W
authors.initials: RW
authors.lastname: Morris
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001245:Association Learning; D003214:Conditioning, Classical; D003463:Cues; D005108:Extinction, Psychological; D005239:Fear; D005260:Female; D006185:Habituation, Psychophysiologic; D007266:Inhibition, Psychological; D051381:Rats; D017208:Rats, Wistar; D012054:Reinforcement, Psychology; D012193:Reversal Learning; D012931:Social Environment