Place of delay and interference in long delay learning

Abstract

Three groups of rats were trained to select the rewarded side of a T-maze with a 1-minute delay of reward. One group spent the delay in the home cage, a second group was delayed in a separate chamber resembling the startbox of the T--maze, and the third group was delayed in the startbox. All rats were rewarded for a correct choice in the startbox of the T-maze. It was found that the group delayed in the home cage learned the discrimination, the group delayed in the startbox did not learn, and the group delayed in the separate chamber were intermediate. The results are explained in terms of Revusky's (1971) concurrent interference theory and in terms of Lett's (in press) memory theory.