ONTOGENIC DIFFERENCES IN ETHANOL-INDUCED IMPAIRMENT OF CONTEXT AND CSLEARNING

A hypothesized action of ethanol is that it reduces processing of cont extual stimuli. Given previous reports of age-related differences in s timulus selection, in the present study we utilized a conditioned supp ression paradigm within an enhanced sensory context to examine the eff ects of ethanol on context and tone learning in preweanling and adult Sprague-Dawley rats as a function of tone-footshock interval. Although ethanol had some impairing influence on both context and tone conditi oning in adults, tone responding nevertheless remained evident, wherea s context conditioning was abolished regardless of the tone-footshock interval. In preweanlings, both context and tone responding were aboli shed by ethanol unless training occurred with contiguous tone-footshoc k pairings. It is suggested that age-specific modes of encoding are di fferentially sensitive to the effects of alcohol.