Retrograde amnesia for discriminated taste aversions: A memory deficit.

Trained 50 male Sprague-Dawley rats in a saccharin-anise discriminated taste aversion paradigm. Saline or pentylenetetrazol (metrazol), an amnesia agent, was administered either within or after the CS-UCS interval. Retrograde amnesia (RA) resulted in both cases, but was stronger when induced after the UCS. Due to the nature of the discriminated-avoidance paradigm used, the RA could not be explained in terms of the punishing effects of the RA treatment or general disinhibition. Data indicate that an amnesic treatment causes a memory deficit, at least part of which is due to the disruption of the CS trace. (20 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)