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Appetitive-aversive interactions in Pavlovian fear conditioning
Helen M Nasser1, Gavan P McNally
1School of Psychology, The University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia.
Behavioral Neuroscience
|May 31, 2012
Summary
Investigating how appetitive and aversive learning interact in the brain reveals that positive cues hinder new fear learning but enhance fear acquisition to other cues. These findings support opponent process theory in motivation.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Behavioral Psychology
- Learning and Memory
Background:
- Mammalian brains possess neurons coding for value and salience, particularly in the habenula and ventral tegmental area.
- Interactions between appetitive (rewarding) and aversive (punishing) conditioning are of significant scientific interest.
- Understanding these interactions is crucial for deciphering motivational system dynamics.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate behavioral interactions between Pavlovian appetitive and aversive conditioning.
- To assess how an appetitive conditioned stimulus (CS) influences fear learning when paired with shock.
- To provide a behavioral model for studying neural correlates of these interactions.
Main Methods:
- Utilized Pavlovian fear conditioning paradigms.
- Assessed counterconditioning (transforming an appetitive CS into a fear CS) and superconditioning (augmenting fear to a neutral CS).
- Manipulated the associability of the appetitive CS and the aversiveness of the shock unconditioned stimulus (US).
Main Results:
- An appetitive CS significantly retarded the rate of fear learning (counterconditioning).
- The presence of the appetitive CS enhanced fear learning to a simultaneously presented neutral CS (superconditioning).
- Retardation of fear learning was not improved by restoring appetitive CS associability but was alleviated by increasing shock US aversiveness.
Conclusions:
- Findings support the concept of opponent interactions between appetitive and aversive motivational systems.
- Demonstrated that appetitive cues can inhibit and facilitate different aspects of aversive learning.
- Established a behavioral framework for exploring the neural basis of appetitive-aversive interactions.
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