In two species, females exhibit superior working memory and inferior reference memory on the water radial-arm maze

Male and female mice and rats were tested on a water escape version of the radial-arm maze designed to measure working and reference memory. In both s pecies, females exhibited superior working memory during acquisition, and w ere better able to handle a higher memory load. However, male mice and rats exhibited better reference memory than females during the asymptotic porti on of testing. Our data suggest that females may be better at working memor y when both working and reference memory information must be learned simult aneously, and males better at reference memory when it has been differentia ted from working memory. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved .