Female Rats Take Longer Than Male Rats to Update Reward Expectancies When Outcomes Are Worse Than Expected

The ability to update predictive relationships and adjust behavior accordingly is critical for survival. Females take longer to update expectancies under conditions of outcome omission. It remains unknown whether that is also the case under conditions when outcomes are delivered such as in overexpec...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Behavioral neuroscience 2020-10, Vol.134 (5), p.417-423
Main Authors: Lay, Belinda P. P, Frate, Michelle, Lozzi, Megan, Esber, Guillem R, Iordanova, Mihaela D
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Animal
Animal Sex Differences
Expectations
Extinction (Learning)
Female
Females
Gender differences
Male
Prediction
Rats
Reinforcement
Rewards
Rodents
Sex differences
Training
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Summary:The ability to update predictive relationships and adjust behavior accordingly is critical for survival. Females take longer to update expectancies under conditions of outcome omission. It remains unknown whether that is also the case under conditions when outcomes are delivered such as in overexpectation. Here we examined whether male and female rats are able to learn from overexpectation using the same learning parameters. Our data show that males but not females learn from overexpectation when given just a single day of compound training, whereas both sexes learn when given extended 2 days of overexpectation training. These data provide important insight into sex differences that link with prior work and thus open an avenue for the study of how conflicting memories interact in the male and female brain.
ISSN:0735-7044
1939-0084
DOI:10.1037/bne0000396