Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Birds Of A Feather: Exploring Social Facilitation Effects On Learning And Suboptimal Choice In Pigeons (Columba Livia), Peyton Mueller

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

The social facilitation effect describes a change in the behavior of an individual due to the presence of another organism of the same species (i.e., a conspecific). Many theories exist that attempt to explain why this change in behavior exists across species. A set of four experiments were executed to best explain how pigeons learn in the presence of non-competing conspecifics. The first experiment sought to replicate an interesting effect previously found in cockroaches and rats, such that conspecific presence inhibits performance early in training but facilitates it with increased training. The second experiment placed the novel response acquired in …

Prenatal Ethanol Exposure Impairs Performance On Spatial And Tactile Sequential Discrimination Task In Juvenile Rats, Caleb S. Bailey

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASDs) are a set of cognitive and behavioral abnormalities that arise in ~5% of children who have been prenatally-exposed to alcohol. Prenatal alcohol exposure (PAE) can cause impairments in learning acquisition, working memory, response inhibition, and attentional-set shifting that result in exaggerated deficits in executive function and impairments in goal-seeking behavior. There are standard procedures used in rodent research to address some components of these deficits, but few procedures are sensitive enough to comprehensively assess such deficits. To address this issue in FASDs research techniques, we developed a procedure that requires prolonged executive function in a …

The Effects Of Social And Nonsocial Contextual Stimuli On The Renewal Of Cocaine Seeking, Bree Humburg

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Those with substance use disorders can undergo craving and relapse when re-exposed to a drug-associated context. This study determined if renewal of cocaine seeking is differentially controlled by contexts consisting of social and/or nonsocial stimuli. Experiment 1, rats self-administered cocaine in Context A which included a social peer and house light illumination. Following self-administration, rats were randomly assigned to an AAA or ABA group for extinction and renewal. For the AAA rats, context was similar to self-administration; for ABA rats, the drug-associated stimuli (peer and house light) were removed (Context B). Following extinction, renewal of cocaine seeking was examined by …

Trait Impulsivity And Acute Alcohol Responses As Markers Of Binge Drinking In Young Adults, Holley Jamison

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Impulsivity, tolerance to alcohol-induced motor impairment, and high sensitivity to alcohol-induced disinhibition each have empirical support as markers of alcohol-related problems. However, research on alcohol response and personality-based markers of risk have remained largely independent lines of research. This dissertation examined how individual differences in these well-established markers may interact to additively contribute to heavy drinking.

Participants were 96 young adults (21-33 years old). with no history of AUD. They self-reported their drinking habits over the prior 90 days, and behavioral tasks measuring disinhibition and motor impairment were administered on two separate days following two alcohol doses (active [0.65 g/kg] …