Characterizing Different Strategies for Resolving Approach-Avoidance Conflict.

ABSTRACT: The ability of animals to maximize benefits and minimize costs during approach-avoidance conflicts is an important evolutionary tool, but little is known about the emergence of specific strategies for conflict resolution. Accordingly, we developed a simple approach-avoidance conflict task in rats that pits the motivation to press a lever for sucrose against the motivation to step onto a distant platform to avoid a footshock delivered at the end of a 30 s tone (sucrose is available only during the tone). Rats received conflict training for 16 days to give them a chance to optimize their strategy by learning to properly time the expression of both behaviors across the tone. Rats unexpectedly separated into three distinct subgroups: those pressing early in the tone and avoiding later (Timers,

SUBMITTER: Bravo-Rivera H 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7947632 | biostudies-literature | 2021

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature