Conditioned audio-visual targeting reflexes in split brain cats

Abstract

A conditioned audio-visual targeting reflex was elaborated in 12 freely moving cats. The cats had to localize the loudspeaker emitting by a tone of 1600 Hz, of 500 ms duration and 80 dB intensity. Each time one of the eight loudspeakers placed in front and behind the cat was activated and the targeting reaction rewarded by food. Normal cats attained the 80 percent criterion for the front and rear loudspeakers in 20 and 30 sessions, respectively. The influence of the transection of the corpus callosum on acquisition and retention of the targeting reaction was investigated. The split brain animals with pre-operative experience in the situation did not show any retention, but relearned the targeting of the frontal sources in 20 sessions. No relearning of the posterior sound sources was observed. The animals that had only post-operative training did not reach 80 percent of correct responses in 50 sessions. Corpus callosum transection influences the integration of the targeting reaction in different ways, depending on the position of the sound source and on pre-operative training.