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THE CANINE SAND MAZE: AN APPETITIVE SPATIAL MEMORY PARADIGM SENSITIVE TO AGE‐RELATED CHANGE IN DOGS
Author(s) -
Salvin Hannah E.,
McGreevy Paul D.,
Sachdev Perminder S.,
Valenzuela Michael J.
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
journal of the experimental analysis of behavior
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.75
H-Index - 61
eISSN - 1938-3711
pISSN - 0022-5002
DOI - 10.1901/jeab.2011.95-109
Subject(s) - habituation , audiology , psychology , spatial learning , cognition , medicine , developmental psychology , neuroscience
Aged dogs exhibit a spectrum of cognitive abilities including a syndrome similar to Alzheimer's disease. A major impediment to research so far has been the lack of a quick and accurate test of visuospatial memory appropriate for community‐based animals. We therefore report on the development and validation of the Canine Sand Maze. A 4.5‐m‐diameter circular pool was filled with a sand and powdered food reward mix to a depth of 10 cm. Dogs were given 4 habituation and 16 learning trials which alternated a food reward being half (control trials) or fully‐buried (acquisition trials) in a fixed location. After a 90‐min break, a probe trial was conducted. Cognitively normal, aged (> 8 years, n = 11) and young (1–4 years, n = 11), breed‐matched dogs were compared. After correction for differences in control trials, average probe times were 2.97 and 10.81 s for young and aged dogs, respectively. In the probe trial, both groups spent significantly more time in the target quadrant but there was a trend for young dogs to cross a 1 m 2 annulus zone around the buried reward more frequently (2.6 times) than aged dogs (1.5 times). Test—retest reliability in a subset of young dogs (n = 5) was high. On the basis of these findings, the Canine Sand Maze is presented as a quick, sensitive and nonaversive tool for assessing spatial learning and reference memory in dogs.