Short-term retrograde amnesia in rats.

Abstract
Retroactive effects of electroconvulsive shock (ECS) were studied in 477 male hooded rats which received ECS 0.5[long dash]60.0 sec. after single passive avoidance training trials. As in previous studies, impairment in retention was inversely related to duration of ECS-delay interval. However, unlike earlier studies, impairment was observed only at relatively short (0.5-10.0 sec.) ECS-delays. Impairment is attributed to brief RA (retrograde amnesia) and not to aversive effects of ECS which were shown to develop only after repeated ECS treatments. The results are discussed in terms of both the consolidation hypothesis and alternative "conflict" and "competing-response" hypotheses of ECS effects.

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