Latent inhibition following systemic DSP4: effects due to presence and absence of contextual cues in taste-aversion...

Three taste-aversion experiments were performed to test the effect of noradrenaline (NA) depletion, following systemic administration of N-(2-chloroethyl)-N-ethyl-2-bromobenzylamine (DSP4), upon the Lubow "latent inhibition" effect in rats. DSP4-treated rats did not demonstrate any attenuation of latent inhibition, the conditioned stimulus (CS) preexposure effect. Instead, when the contextual conditions (provided by a noise-producing bottle) were so arranged that there was a "mismatch" from the saccharin preexposure to the saccharin-aversion conditioning phase, the DSP4 rats showed some considerable enhancement of latent inhibition. This disruption of the contextual control of the degree of latent inhibition evinced by the NA-depleted rats was found to bear a striking resemblance to the attenuated contextual control of extinction in taste aversion by DSP4 treated rats demonstrated earlier. Biochemical analysis of noradrenaline and serotonin accumulation performed after Experiment 1, and postdecapitation reflex analysis after each experiment, confirmed the selective NA depletion. These results are compared to earlier findings concerning noradrenaline and latent inhibition and the effects are discussed with reference to selective attentional and retrieval-based models of noradrenaline function in learning and memory.