Changes in Maternal Behavior in Rats During Exposure to a Stimulus Predicting Shock

Abstract

Previous research has established that Pavlovian fear-conditioned stimuli exert inhibitory effects when superimposed on appetitive contingencies. The study reported here shows that a shock signal will suppress specific maternal behaviors in dams exposed to stimulus-shock pairings before their litters were born. The suppression of maternal behavior in the form of oral contacts with pups and time spent in proximity to pups occurred in the home cage, while stimulus-shock pairings occurred in an operant chamber. The pattern of findings for three control groups, stimulus only, shock only, and random stimulus-shock, indicates that the suppression effect is dependent on the association of the stimulus and shock and not just the result of being shocked or exposed to the stimulus.