"Differential effects of posterior septal lesions on dispositional and representational memory": Correction to Thomas and Gash (1986)

• Published in: Behavioral neuroscience 1987-02, Vol.101 (1), p.12-12
• Main Authors: Thomas, Garth J., Gash, Don M.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Discrimination Learning; Memory; Rats; Septal Nuclei
• ISSN: 0735-7044; 1939-0084
• DOI: 10.1037/h0090392

Reports an error in "Differential effects of posterior septal lesions on dispositional and representational memory" by Garth J. Thomas and Don M. Gash ( Behavioral Neuroscience, 1986[Oct], Vol 100[5], 712-719). A phrase was erroneously deleted from the text. In the seventh paragraph on p. 713, the second sentence should read as follows: Early in training individual differences were great, but by the end of adaptation training, individual differences were quite small and all rats responded at close to asymptotic speeds. (The following abstract of the original article appeared in record 1987-06585-001.) A distinction between 2 classes of memory has been made in terms of the sensory availability of cues at the time of making discriminations that are influenced by past experience. Three tasks objectively defining this distinction were learned in a T-maze by 36 male Long-Evans rats in 3 groups: (a) a delayed non-matching-to-sample (DNMTS) that depended on representational memory; (b) a simple sensory discrimination (SD) that depended on dispositional memory; and (c) a more difficult discrimination that also depended on dispositional memory, called the simultaneous conditional discrimination (SCD). The DNMTS and SD tasks were acquired quickly; the SCD task took many more trials. Posterior septal lesions impaired DNMTS performance but had no effect on retention of tasks that depended on dispositional memory. Results indicate that dispositional and representational memory systems have at least partially distinct anatomical substrates in the brain and that it is the representational and not the conditional aspects of the DNMTS task that are impaired by the septal lesions. (21 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)