Pe. Vera-villarroel et S. Alarcon, Excitatory and inhibitory conditioning of two physiological responses in agroup of rats, PSICOTHEMA, 12(3), 2000, pp. 466-470
A differential conditioning of 120 essays was carried out in a four-day per
iod in a group of rats. The stimuli were the following: a light (CS-), a to
ne (CS+) and an electric discharge (US). After six days, the subjects we re
randomly subdivided into different groups. Each of the groups was submitte
d in the trial phase to 15 occurrences of one of the following stimuli: CS, CS-, US, CS+/CS- and the context. No significant differences were found a
t the lymphocyte response level (p<0,05). Regarding the protein amount, alm
ost all groups showed higher indexes than the control group. However, only
the group submitted to the excitatory stimulus show differences when compar
ed with the control group. In the discussion over the results, two main fac
tors are stressed: the significance of contextual clues in the modification
of physiological responses and the importance of inhibitory stimuli in bal
ancing the effects of excitatory conditioning.