Infantile Handling and the Extinction of Responses Acquired under Food Reward

Abstract

A comparison was made of the runway behaviour of rats which had been handled from Days 1–21 and their non-handled litter mates. The training began on Day 70 after the animals were habituated to a restricted food schedule for 10 days. The subjects were given six trials each day in the runway and were rewarded with a 0.045 g. Noyes pellet. After 10 days of rewarded training trials, subjects were given 6 extinction trials a day for 10 days. Results showed that handled rats ran faster than non-handled rats during acquisition and during the first 3 days of extinction. The extinction data suggested that the relationship between emotionality and effects of frustrative non-reward should be re-evaluated.