RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Normal Aging Alters Learning and Attention-Related Teaching Signals in Basolateral Amygdala
JF The Journal of Neuroscience
JO J. Neurosci.
FD Society for Neuroscience
SP 13137
OP 13144
DO 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2393-12.2012
VO 32
IS 38
A1 Matthew R. Roesch
A1 Guillem R. Esber
A1 Daniel W. Bryden
A1 Domenic H. Cerri
A1 Zachary R. Haney
A1 Geoffrey Schoenbaum
YR 2012
UL http://www.jneurosci.org/content/32/38/13137.abstract
AB Normal aging has been associated with an increased propensity to wait for rewards. When this is tested experimentally, rewards are typically offered at increasing delays. In this setting, persistent responding for delayed rewards in aged rats could reflect either changes in the evaluation of delayed rewards or diminished learning, perhaps due to the loss of subcortical teaching signals induced by changes in reward; the loss or diminution of such teaching signals would result in slower learning with progressive delay of reward, which would appear as persistent responding. Such teaching signals have commonly been reported in phasic firing of midbrain dopamine neurons; however, similar signals have also been found in reward-responsive neurons in the basolateral amygdala (ABL). Unlike dopaminergic teaching signals, those in ABL seem to reflect surprise, increasing when reward is either better or worse than expected. Accordingly, activity is correlated with attentional responses and with the speed of learning after surprising increases or decreases in reward. Here we examined whether these attention-related teaching signals might be altered in normal aging. Young (3–6 months) and aged (22–26 months) male Long–Evans rats were trained on a discounting task used previously to demonstrate these signals. As expected, aged rats were less sensitive to delays, and this change was associated with a loss of attentional changes in orienting behavior and neural activity. These results indicate that normal aging alters teaching signals in the ABL. Changes in these teaching signals may contribute to a host of age-related cognitive changes.