Benefits of Stimulus Exposure: Developmental Learning Independent of Task Performance.
Benefits of Stimulus Exposure: Developmental Learning Independent of Task Performance.
复制标题
DOI：
10.3389/fnins.2016.00263
复制
发表时间：
2016
影响因子：
4.3
通讯作者：
Rosen MJ
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Green DB;Ohlemacher J;Rosen MJ
感知学习（训练诱导的表现改善）可以通过任务无关刺激暴露在人类中引起。相反，与任务无关的刺激暴露在动物身上，通常会破坏幼年动物的感知能力，而对成年动物几乎没有影响。这可能是由于接触的程度，人类是短暂的，而动物是慢性的。在这里，我们评估了短时间被动刺激暴露对沙鼠发育过程中学习的影响，并与非被动刺激暴露（即在测试期间）进行了比较。我们使用声惊吓反应的预脉冲抑制，一种可以应用于任何年龄的方法，来测量跨越发育的四个年龄组的间隙检测阈值。首先，我们发现间隙检测阈值和间隙检测学习都呈现出一个长期的发展轨迹，在整个青少年时期不断提高。此外，我们证明了年轻动物的内部和跨动物性能差异较大。这些结果通常与人类的结果一致，在人类中，对于暂时变化的信号的感知和感知训练的影响，以及儿童中增加的可变性和较差的表现一致性，都有延长的发展轨迹。然后，我们选择了一个表现出清晰学习能力的年龄（青少年中期），以评估短暂被动刺激暴露对这种学习的影响。我们比较了在三个阶段中接受间隙检测测试（间隙与惊吓相结合）或同等的间隙暴露（没有测试）的中等青少年的学习情况。这两组的学习能力是相同的，并且比naïve年龄匹配的动物和只接受间隔暴露但只接受惊吓测试的对照组都要好。因此，独立于任务表现的短时间间隔暴露足以诱导这个年龄段的学习，并且与间隙检测测试一样有效。
Perceptual learning (training-induced performance improvement) can be elicited by task-irrelevant stimulus exposure in humans. In contrast, task-irrelevant stimulus exposure in animals typically disrupts perception in juveniles while causing little to no effect in adults. This may be due to the extent of exposure, which is brief in humans while chronic in animals. Here we assessed the effects of short bouts of passive stimulus exposure on learning during development in gerbils, compared with non-passive stimulus exposure (i.e., during testing). We used prepulse inhibition of the acoustic startle response, a method that can be applied at any age, to measure gap detection thresholds across four age groups, spanning development. First, we showed that both gap detection thresholds and gap detection learning across sessions displayed a long developmental trajectory, improving throughout the juvenile period. Additionally, we demonstrated larger within- and across-animal performance variability in younger animals. These results are generally consistent with results in humans, where there are extended developmental trajectories for both the perception of temporally-varying signals, and the effects of perceptual training, as well as increased variability and poorer performance consistency in children. We then chose an age (mid-juveniles) that displayed clear learning over sessions in order to assess effects of brief passive stimulus exposure on this learning. We compared learning in mid-juveniles exposed to either gap detection testing (gaps paired with startles) or equivalent gap exposure without testing (gaps alone) for three sessions. Learning was equivalent in both these groups and better than both naïve age-matched animals and controls receiving no gap exposure but only startle testing. Thus, short bouts of exposure to gaps independent of task performance is sufficient to induce learning at this age, and is as effective as gap detection testing.