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Conditioned reflexes in decorticate rabbits

  • Physiology
  • Published:
Bulletin of Experimental Biology and Medicine Aims and scope

Summary

Experiments were performed on rabbits using the conditioned reflex method developed by A. A. Volokhov and G. A. Obraztsova; these showed that in decorticate rabbits it is possible to develop defensive reflexes which consist of making “shaking off” movements, and that differentiations may be developed (the conditioned defensive signal was either the sound of a bell, or a light flickering at 120 times per minute; a bell striking 60 times per minute served as the differential signal). However, in decorticate rabbits the positive and negative conditioned reflexes are less stable, and become extinct when the experiments are stopped for 9 months, whereas in the intact animals the reflexes are preserved. Both the conditioned and unconditioned “shaking off” reflex is better developed in decorticate than in intact rabbits, the latter showing a greater tendency simply to run away.

In this respect the behavior of the decorticate rabbit is more like that of the young animals.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of the Physiology of Aging and of the Pathology of the Nervous System, Institute of Normal and Pathological Physiology, AMN SSSR, Moscow

    O. A. Krylov

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  1. O. A. Krylov
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Krylov, O.A. Conditioned reflexes in decorticate rabbits. Bull Exp Biol Med 48, 1441–1445 (1959). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00792731

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00792731

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