A characterization of approach and avoidance learning in alcohol-preferring and alcohol-nonpreferring rats

Although numerous biochemical and physiological differences have been shown to be correlated with alcohol preference, less is known about behavioral factors that may correlate with alcohol preference. Using a signaled barpressing task, alcohol-preferring (P; n = 18) and alcohol-nonpreferring (NP; n = 19) rats were compared for their ability to learn an appetitive and an aversive task. Results showed that P rats had difficulty learning the tasks in comparison with NP and nonselected, control rats when appetitive training was given first. However, if aversive training came first, the NP rats performed poorly in comparison with the P and nonselected rats. These results suggest that these lines of rats may differ in behavioral inhibition and sensitivity to conditioned fear. Furthermore, these behavioral differences may offer a richer analysis of the traits that were co-selected with the alcohol-seeking and alcohol-avoiding phenotypes.