TRACE EYEBLINK CLASSICAL-CONDITIONING IN THE MONKEY - A NONSURGICAL METHOD AND BEHAVIORAL-ANALYSIS

Classical eyeblink conditioning has been used extensively to study the neurobiology of associative learning and memory in rabbits and in hum ans. During the last several years, new developments have renewed inte rest in the possibility of studying classical conditioning in monkeys. Specifically, it is now known that impaired conditioning can be obser ved in humans with various neurologic problems, including amnesia, and thus there is now considerable interest in the neurobiology of human eyeblink conditioning. Research involving monkeys, in which discrete l esions of anatomically defined neural structures can be produced, has the potential to provide information that might not be readily availab le from work in humans. Here, the authors present a simple, nonsurgica l method for classically conditioning the eyeblink response in monkeys and report behavioral results using a trace conditioning paradigm tha t is sensitive to hippocampal damage in both rabbits and humans. This method is reliable and effective for recording eyeblinks and shows tha t robust eyeblink classical conditioning can be readily established in the monkey.