THE EFFECT OF APPETITIVE AND AVERSIVE OLFACTORY STIMULI ON ACOUSTIC STARTLE RESPONSE IN RATS

Gillian Bradley, Yuchen Feng, Mary Labowsky, Mike Magaraci, Mason McGill, Ronak Mistry, Rupal Parikh, Purvee Patel, Travis Perlee, Rebecca Rosen, Doug Wagner, Jasmine Zhuang

Advisor: Dr. Graham Cousens
Assistant: Jennifer Sissman

ABSTRACT

The amplitude of the startle response of conditioned rats was shown to be unaffected when in the presence of an olfactory stimulus that was associated with an appetitive reward or a neutral stimulus. During conditioning, rats were trained to distinguish between the odors amyl acetate and cineole by pairing amyl acetate with a reward of sucrose solution and cineole with a lengthened blackout period. It was hypothesized that the amyl acetate would be associated with a pleasurable emotional state and therefore would attenuate the startle response. When the amplitude of the startle response was measured, the results did not show any significant differences in the presence of amyl acetate, cineole, or the control of no odor. Therefore, the experiment did not show any conclusive data for or against the attenuation of startle when an olfactory cue is linked with an assumed pleasurable state of mind.