title: Blocking of conditioning of tentacle lowering in the snail (Helix aspersa).
abstract: Experiment 1 established the effectiveness of an appetitive conditioning of odours procedure with snails (Helix aspersa) that was subsequently used for the study of blocking. In this important phenomenon, the conditioning of a CS1 (where CS is the conditioned stimulus) prior to conditioning of a compound, CS1CS2, blocked the conditioning to the CS2. Experiments 2a, 2b, and 2c demonstrated this associative effect using three different experimental controls. Experiments 3a and 3b replicated the blocking effect and allowed us to reject an explanation of blocking based on generalized effects of several treatments of diverse stimuli in blocking and control groups (the pseudoblocking effect). The implications of these results for the study of invertebrate cognition by means of conditioning techniques are discussed.
authors.affiliation: University of Oviedo, Oviedo, Spain.
authors.forename: Félix
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Acebes
authors.forename: Patricia
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Solar
authors.forename: Susana
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Carnero
authors.forename: Ignacio
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Loy
mesh_terms: D000704:Analysis of Variance; D000818:Animals; D001070:Appetitive Behavior / Q000502:physiology*; D001245:Association Learning / Q000502:physiology; D001362:Avoidance Learning / Q000502:physiology; D001522:Behavior, Animal / Q000502:physiology; D003214:Conditioning, Classical / Q000502:physiology*; D006372:Helix, Snails / Q000502:physiology*; D009812:Odorants; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology