ROBUST CONDITIONED FLAVOR PREFERENCES WITH A SENSORY PRECONDITIONING PROCEDURE

During sensory preconditioning, rats were given two distinct flavors ( saccharin and coffee) in sequence with 0, 9, or 27 sec between the two flavors. A control group received the flavors unpaired. In subsequent training, the second flavor preceded sucrose by 5 min. Later, the sub jects that had had 0- or 9-sec delays between the two flavors showed a significant preference for the flavor not directly reinforced, wherea s those that had had a 27-sec delay showed only a marginally significa nt preference. Although taste aversions have been produced using these methods, this is the first demonstration of conditioned preferences f or flavors not directly associated with the reinforcers. These results offer an alternative way to study flavor-flavor learning.