Phrasing cues and hierarchical organization in serial pattern learning by rats.

In Exp I, 42 female albino Sprague-Dawley rats received food quantities in a T-maze in a serial pattern. Ss learned under either no cue, temporal cue, place cue, and/or combined temporal-place cue conditions. In Exp II, 45 female albino Sprague-Dawley rats in the T-maze were trained in complex subpatterns with place cues or no cues. Exp I showed that phrasing facilitated pattern learning as long as phrasing cues were available but that Ss learned different things when different kinds of phrasing cues were used. Exp II showed that phrasing a pattern into formally complex rather than formally simple chunks produced poor learning. Overall findings demonstrate the rat's capacity to abstract and use higher-order rules in hierarchical serial patterns, especially when phrasing cues are available to facilitate the process. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)