When given a choice between getting a high reward that requires climbing a high ramp or
pressing a lever multiple times, versus freely obtaining a low reward, healthy rats prefer
the former, while rats with lesions to the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) prefer the latter.
We developed two novel effort tasks to examine if ACC mediates other types of physical
effort (weight-lifting) as well as emotional effort (courage). We replicated previous
findings on a modified version of the ramp-climbing task, showing that ACC lesions
impair these decisions. Lesions of ACC did not impair weight-lifting effort, even when
higher levels of effort were used and training on the task was eliminated. Initially,
lesions of ACC did not impair courage effort. When the task effort was subsequently
increased, rats with ACC lesions showed a failure to adapt to novelty throughout testing.
This research indicated that not all effort is mediated by ACC. / xii, 177 leaves : ill. ; 29 cm
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:ALU.w.uleth.ca/dspace#10133/3433 |
| Date | January 2013 |
| Creators | Holec, Victoria, University of Lethbridge. Faculty of Arts and Science |
| Contributors | Euston, David, McDonald, Robert |
| Publisher | Lethbridge, Alta. : University of Lethbridge, [Dept. of] Neuroscience, c2013, Arts and Science, Department of Neuroscience |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | en_CA |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Relation | Thesis (University of Lethbridge. Faculty of Arts and Science) |
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