Abstract
A five-choice serial reaction time task was used to study the effects of serotonin (5-HT) receptor agonists and antagonists on accuracy of performance and food-motivated behaviour. Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), 0.1 mg/kg IP and quipazine, 2.5 mg/kg IP significantly reduced the percentage of correct responses and increased the percentage of omissions with no effect on other measures such as latency to collect the reinforcement or to respond correctly. The effects of LSD and quipazine were reversed by 1–2 mg/kg ritanserin, a potent 5-HT2 and 5-HT1C receptor antagonist. Metachlorophenylpiperazine (mCPP) 2.5 mg/kg IP, an agonist at 5-HT1B and 5-HT1C receptors, andd-fenfluramine (DF) 1.25 mg/kg IP, a releaser of 5-HT from nerve terminals and inhibitor of 5-HT uptake, increased the percentage of omissions and the latency to respond correctly or to collect the reinforcement with no effects on the correct responses. Effects similar to those of mCPP and DF were obtained by 60 min access to food before testing. Haloperidol, 0.1 mg/kg IP, did not affect the percentage of correct responses or the latency to collect the reinforcement, but significantly increased the proportion of errors of omission and the latency to respond correctly. The results show that 5-HT2 receptor agonists cause attentional disturbances at doses that have no marked effect on motivation for food or speed. An increase in the latency to collect the reinforcement was found only with prefeeding and drugs supposed to cause satiety such as mCPP and DF. An increase in latency to respond correctly and in the percentage of omissions seemed related to haloperidol-induced motor retardation and reduced level of arousal. The five-choice serial reaction time task seems useful for separating effects on attentional processes from those on food-motivated behaviour or motor activity.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Ansfield PJ, Johnson JI (1961) Differential effects of LSD-25 in blind and normal rats. Paper read at Am Psychol Assoc, New York
Appel JB (1968) The effects of “psychotomimetic” drugs on animal behavior. In: Efron DH (ed) Psychopharmacology. A review of progress 1957–1967. GPO, Washington, pp 1211–1222
Appel JB, Cunningham KA (1986) The use of drug discrimination procedures to characterize hallucinogenic drug actions. Psychopharmacol Bull 22:959–967
Becker DI, Appel JB, Freedman DX (1967) Some effects of lysergic acid diethylamide on visual discrimination in pigeons. Psychopharmacologia 11:354–364
Bevan P (1989) 5-HT and sexual behaviour. In: Bevan P, Cools AR, Archer T (eds) Behavioural pharmacology of 5-HT. Lawrence Erlbaum, Hillsdale, pp 33–34
Carli M, Robbins TW, Evenden JL, Everitt BJ (1983) Effects of lesions to ascending noradrenergic neurones on performance of a 5-choice serial reaction task in rats; implications for theories of dorsal noradrenergic bundle function based on selective attention and arousal. Behav Brain Res 9:361–380
Cole BJ, Robbins TW (1987) Amphetamine impairs the discriminative performance of rats with dorsal noradrenergic bundle lesions on a 5-choice serial reaction time task: new evidence for central dopaminergic-noradrenergic interactions. Psychopharmacology 91:458–466
Cole BJ, Robbins TW (1989) Effects of 6-hydroxydopamine lesions of the nucleus accumbens septi on performance of a 5-choice serial reaction time task in rats: implications for theories of selective attention and arousal. Behav Brain Res 33:165–179
Conn PJ, Sanders-Bush E (1987) Central serotonin receptors: effector systems, physiological roles and regulation. Psychopharmacology 92:267–277
Fielding S, Lal H (1978) Behavioral actions of neuroleptics. In: Iversen LL, Iversen SD, Snyder SH (eds) Handbook of psychopharmacology, vol 10. Plenum Press, New York, pp 91–128
Frazer A, Maayani S, Wolfe BB (1990) Subtypes of receptors for serotonin. Annu Rev Pharmacol Toxicol 30:307–348
Freedman DX, Appel JD, Hartman FR, Molliver MD (1964) Tolerance to behavioral effects of LSD 25 in rat. J Pharmacol Exp Ther 143:309–318
Fuster JM (1957) Tachistoscopic perception in monkeys. Fed Proc 16:43
Glennon RA, Titeler M, Young R (1986) Structure-activity relationships and mechanism of action of hallucinogenic agents based on drug discrimination and radioligand binding studies. Psychopharmacol Bull 22:953–958
Harvey JA, Gormenzano I, Cool-Hauser VA (1988) Effects of LSD on classical conditioning as a function of CS-UCS interval: relationship to reflex facilitation. Pharmacol Biochem Behav 30:433–441
Henck JW, Rezabek DH, Rech RH (1985) Comparison of anorexia and motor disruption by cyclazocine and quipazine. Pharmacol Biochem Behav 22:671–676
Hewson G, Leighton GE, Hill RG, Hughes J (1988) Quipazine reduces food intake in the rat by activation of 5-HT2 receptors. Br J Pharmacol 95:598–604
Hoyer D (1988) Functional correlates of serotonin 5-HT1 recognition sites. J Recept Res 8:59–81
Jarrard LE (1963) Effects ofd-lysergic acid diethylamide on operant behavior in the rat. Psychopharmacologia 5:39–46
Key BJ (1961) The effects of drugs on discrimination and sensory generalisation of auditory stimuli in cats. Psychopharmacologia 2:352–363
Leysen JE, Gommeren W, Van Gompel P, Wynants J, Janssen PFM, Laduron PM (1985) Receptor-binding properties in vitro and in vivo of ritanserin. A very potent and long acting serotonin-S2 antagonist. Mol Pharmacol 27:600–611
Lorden JF, Rickert EJ, Berry DW (1983) Forebrain monoamines and associative learning: I. Latent inhibition and conditioned inhibition. Behav Brain Res 9:181–199
Osborne NN, Hamon M (eds) (1988) Neuronal serotonin. John Wiley, Chichester
Peroutka SJ (1988) 5-Hydroxytryptamine receptor subtypes. Annu Rev Neurosci 11:45–60
Quirion R, Richard J, Dam TV (1985) Evidence for the existence of serotonin type-2 receptors on cholinergic terminals in rat cortex. Brain Res 333:345–349
Rech RH, Mokler DJ (1986) Disruption of operant behavior by hallucinogenic drugs. Psychopharmacol Bull 22:968–972
Robbins TW, Everitt BJ, Marston HM, Wilkinson J, Jones GH, Page KJ (1989) Comparative effects of ibotenic acid- and quisqualic acid-induced lesions of the substantia innominata on attentional function in the rat: further implications for the role of the cholinergic neurons of the nucleus basalis in cognitive processes. Behav Brain Res 35:221–240
Samanin R, Garattini S (1990) The pharmacology of serotonergic drugs affecting appetite. In: Wurtman RJ, Wurtman JJ (eds) Nutrition and the brain, vol 8. Raven Press, New York, pp 163–192
Samanin R, Bendotti C, Miranda F, Garattini S (1977) Decrease of food intake by quipazine in the rat: relation to serotoninergic receptor stimulation. J Pharm Pharmacol 29:53–54
Samanin R, Mennini T, Bendotti C, Barone D, Caccia S, Garattini S (1989) Evidence that central 5-HT2 receptors do not play an important role in the anorectic activity ofd-fenfluramine in the rat. Neuropharmacology 28:465–469
Schechter LE, Simansky KJ (1988) 1-(2,5-dimethoxy-4-iodophenyl)-2-aminopropane (DOI) exerts an anorexic action that is blocked by 5-HT2 antagonists in rats. Psychopharmacology 94:342–346
Schwartz D, Hernandez L, Hoebel BG (1989) Fenfluramine administered systemically or locally increases extracellular serotonin in the lateral hypothalamus as measured by microdialysis. Brain Res 482:261–270
Shukla R, MacKenzie-Taylor D, Rech RH (1990) Evidence for 5-HT2 receptor mediation in quipazine anorexia. Psychopharmacology 100:115–118
Siegel S, Freedman DX (1988) Effects of LSD-25 on classical trace conditioning. Pharmacol Biochem Behav 30:427–431
Solomon PR, Kiney CA, Scott DR (1978) Disruption of latent inhibition following systemic administration of parachlorophenylalanine (PCPA). Physiol Behav 20:265–271
Van Wijngaarden IV, Tulp MThM, Soudijn W (1990) The concept of selectivity in 5-HT receptor research. Eur J Pharmacol 188:301–312
Willner P, McGuirk J, Phillips G, Muscat R (1990) Behavioural analys of the anorectic effects of fluoxetine and fenfluramine. Psychopharmacology 102:273–277
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Carli, M., Samanin, R. Serotonin2 receptor agonists and serotonergic anorectic drugs affect rats’ performance differently in a five-choice serial reaction time task. Psychopharmacology 106, 228–234 (1992). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02801977
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02801977