Abstract
The acoustic startle response (ASR) is inhibited when the eliciting stimulus is preceded by a brief gap in background noise. The present study examined the ontogeny of ASR gap inhibition in the rat and the role of experience on its development. Independent groups of Long-Evans rats were tested for 3 consecutive days, at one of eight ages ranging from Postnatal Day (PND) 14–16 to PND 98–100. Gaps (0, 2,4, 8,16, 32, or 64 msec) in broad-band background noise (80 dB on/35 dB off) were presented 190 msec prior to the eliciting stimulus (a 13-kHz, 120-dB, 40–msec tone with 2.5-msec rise/decay). The results show that longer gaps (16–64 msec) inhibited the ASR at all ages; however, the magnitude of inhibition increased with age and repeated testing. The efficacy of shorter gaps (4–8 msec) in the inhibition of the ASR improved until PND 35–37, when the adult pattern was achieved. These findings indicate that both the magnitude of ASR gap inhibition and the efficacy of gaps of less than 16 msec are dependent on the age and experience of the animal.
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Portions of this manuscript were presented as a poster at the 18th Annual Meeting of the Society for Neuroscience, November 15, 1988, Toronto, Canada (Society for Neuroscience Abstracts, 4, 425). The research described in this article has been reviewed by the Health Effects Research Laboratory, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and approved for publication. Approval does not signify that the contents necessarily reflect the views and policies of the Agency, nor does mention of trade names or commercial products constitute endorsement or recommendation for use.
—Accepted by previous editor, Lynn Nadel
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Dean, K.F., Sheets, L.P., Crofton, K.M. et al. The effect of age and experience on inhibition of the acoustic startle response by gaps in background noise. Psychobiology 18, 89–95 (1990). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03327220
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03327220