In spatial tasks

Ahmed FP, McLaughlin DP, Stanford SC, Stamford JA (2002) Maudsley reactive and non-reactive (MNRA) rats display hehavioral contrasts on exposure to an open field, the elevated plus maze or the dark-light shuttle hox. Abstract, FENS, Paris, France Ammassari-Teule A, Milhaud JM, Passino E, Restivo L, LassaUe JM (1999) Defective processing of contextual information may he involved in the poor performance of DBA/2 mice in spatial tasks. Behav Genet 29 283-289 Anisman H, Zalcman S, Shanks N, Zacharko RM (1991) Multisystem regulation of performance deficits induced hy stressors an animal model of depression. In Boulton AA, Baker GB, Martin-lverson MT (eds) Animal models in psychiatry, vol 2. Humana Press, Clifton, pp 1-59... 

A relevant question then as a consequence of this work is whether human infants given formulas containing low levels of n-3 fatty acids may have functional losses in spatial task performance. Lx)sses in brain DHA and considerable elevations in 22 5n-6 have been observed in human infants after formula feeding (45,46). The magnitude of these brain fatty acyl compositional changes is not of the magnitude produced in this work in which the diets were nearly devoid of n-3 fatty acids. 

In spatial OSDs the flow of events and symbols is overlaid on a map of all items of equipment with which the operator interacts during the task. The map itself does not have to be very accurate, provided that the general geographical relationships among items of equipment are shown. The spatial OSD thus provides a graphical description of the perceptual-motor load a particular task imposes on the performance of the worker. For multiperson tasks, the operational sequences for several workers can be coded in different colors and superimposed onto the same equipment map. This can generate useful information for the distribution of tasks to different members of the operating team. 

Spatial recall (windows-in-houses task) brief delay Supraspan auditory word list brief delay, written recall Verbal paired associates delayed recall Visuospatial memory (VIG) complex shape learning Visual paired associates delayed recall Wechsler Memory Scale (WMS) total spatial span Wechsler memory (WAIS) immediate and delayed paragraph recall... 

Clients are assigned different cognitive tasks that exercise the specific areas of the brain that seem to have sustained injury. Tasks can run the gamut, but frequendy involve engaging in spatial-ability, abstraction, verbal, memory, and... 

McNay EC, Eries TM, Gold PE. 2000. Decreases in rat extracellular hippocampal glucose concentration associated with cognitive demand during a spatial task. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 97(6) 2881-2885. 

Quartermain et al. 1993, 1994 Rowan et al. 1990 Winter and Petti 1987). Also, low doses of gepirone and atropine, which individually fail to modify rat performance in a spatial task, when administered together impair performance [Barrett and Rowan 1990]. Similarly, the selection of a single dose of MDL 73,005EF that did not impair the acquisition or recall of a task in the Morris water maze enhanced the deficits caused by gepirone or atropine [Barrett and Rowan 1992]. 

Dudchenko, P. A., Goodridge, J. P., Seit-erle, D. A. and Taube, J. S. (1997) Effects of repeated disorientation on the acquisition of spatial tasks in rats dissociation between the appetetive radial arm maze and aversive water maze. /Exp Psychol 23, 194-210. 

Of course, one caveat for all the aforementioned studies is that they were performed in nonimpaired animals. However, R065-7199 improves scopolamine-induced deficits in this task (37) and recent data from Foley et al. (102) showed that chronic treatment with SB-271046 (once daily, 40 d) improved the age-related impairment in spatial learning and memory in 20-mo-old Wistar rats, an effect also seen in aged Fisher 344 rats (103). Further testing of 5-htg receptor antagonists in glutamate-deficiency models and neurodevelopment-deficiency models is suggested. 

Foley AG, Murphy KJ, Hirst WD, et al. The 5-HT6 receptor antagonist SB-271046 reverses scopolamine-disrupted consolidation of a passive avoidance task and ameliorates spatial task deficits in aged rats. Neuropsychopharmacology... 

The results of the airport study also address a concern raised by McGlone and Harding (1998), namely, that the use of a timeline in Experiments 1 and 2 may have accentuated, or even created, a reliance on spatial representations in this task. It is clearly possible that subjects in the first two studies were influenced by the explicit timeline task to transfer temporal information into a spatial format. However, the persistence of the metaphor consistency effect at O Hare is testament to the psychological reality of these spatio-temporal metaphoric systems. 

For these reasons we turned first to a version of seriation that had no specific spatial task requirement only a search one. Using computer driven touch screens, we displayed a variety of icons varying in size in random linear arrays, and required that subjects touch each one once only, according to a sequential rule such as biggest to smallest. The randomized arrays ensured that there was no correlation between the way the sizes appeared, and (e.g.) the monotonic search path that had to be complied with (see Figure 10.5a). In this way, we have been able to assess size seriation, considered as an extended serial search task without manipulation requirements and spatial confounds. 

Pharmacological manipulation of DA, within mesostriatal, as well as mesofrontal domains, has profound effects on performance in spatial working memory tasks in both rodents and monkeys. Early work (reviewed by LeMoal and Simon, 1991) demonstrated that 6-OHDA-induced lesions of the meso-accumbens or meso-striatal, as well as the meso-cortical DA projections led to impaired delayed alternation performance in rats. However, there is a question of whether the capacity to hold on-line the location of the previous goal or choice response has been impaired or whether other behavioral capacities, such as the inhibition that is normally required for the spontaneous alternation of choices is disrupted, leading to perseverative responding. 

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