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PG 660 Behavioral Pharmacology.
Take Home Examination. 2
8 November 1998.
Work independently on these items. Please put the question at the top
of your answer and for multipart questions use section headers to tell
me what section you are answering. Feel free to ask me about an item that
you have a question about. Each item is worth an equal number of points.
Turn in the examinations by Friday, 4 December 1998 at 12:00 noon. I retain
the option of adding an item should an interesting possibility arise. Enjoy!
Mandatory Items (1, 2, and 3)
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Distinguish among metabolic tolerance, pharmacodynamic tolerance, and behavioral
tolerance (respondent and operant based). In each case give an example
of a drug that produces that kind of tolerance and state exactly why it
is an example, i.e., be specific about the mechanism by which tolerance
develops. Be sure to begin with a definition of tolerance.
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Discuss the concept that stimulus control over behavior mediate drug-effects.
Describe the experimental preparation(s) by which this phenomenon has been
investigated, some of the various conditions under which it has appeared,
and whether it shows any specificity to drug classes. Include, at the end,
a paragraph discussing how this phenomenon might be relevant in other areas.
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The data in Table 1 come from an experiment in which responding was maintained
by food and, in one component, simultaneously suppressed by response-contingent
electric shock (Cook, L. and Sepinwall, J. (1976) Reinforcement schedules
and extrapolations to humans from animals in behavioral pharmacology. In
B. Weiss and V. G. Laties (Eds). Behavioral Pharmacology: The Current
Status. New York: Plenum. Also summarized in Carlton, P.L. (1983) A
Primer of Behavioral Pharmacology, New York: W. H. Freeman. ). Use
these data to answer this question.
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Describe how such data are derived from a FI schedule. Use a figure showing
cumulative responding under a typical FI (say, FI 100") and illustrating
what the bins are.
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Make a "rate-dependency" plot by hand, showing the role of response
rate in determining the drug's effect for the two types of behavior. Use
appropriately labeled and scaled axes. Note the range of data before purchasing
log paper.
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Make a "rate-constancy" plot by hand, showing response rate under
drug conditions as a function of control rate. Use appropriately labeled
and scaled axes.
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Interpret the results in terms of a) response rate and b) the conditions
maintaining behavior.
| Table 1 . Effects of Chlordiazepoxide (CDZ)
on Punished and Unpunished Behavior. |
|
Unpunished Component |
Punished Component |
|
Rate (responses/sec) |
% control |
Rate (responses/sec) |
% control |
| Interval
Bin |
Control |
20 mg/kg
CDZ |
|
Control |
20 mg/kg
CDZ |
|
| 1 |
.5 |
.625 |
|
.008 |
.056 |
|
| 2 |
.7 |
.77 |
|
.0085 |
.051 |
|
| 3 |
.75 |
.78 |
|
.009 |
.049 |
|
| 4 |
.8 |
.8 |
|
0.01 |
.053 |
|
| 5 |
.9 |
.86 |
|
.011 |
.05 |
|
| 6 |
1 |
.8 |
|
.012 |
.048 |
|
| 7 |
1.1 |
.73 |
|
.013 |
.04 |
|
| 8 |
1.3 |
.91 |
|
.015 |
.038 |
|
| 9 |
1.8 |
1.08 |
|
.02 |
.04 |
|
| 10 |
2 |
1 |
|
.025 |
.032 |
|
Optional Items. (Answer Any 3)
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How did Branch and Gollub examine the mechanism by which moderate response
rates seen (on the average) in the middle of the fixed-interval schedule
are changed by amphetamine? Describe the procedure and the conclusions.
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Describe the experimental protocol necessary to demonstrate that behavioral
tolerance has occurred by operant mechanisms. Be sure to discuss the control
procedures required, and why they must be used. Give two examples of behavioral
tolerance from this quarter.
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Describe the approaches that have been taken to measuring and studying
drug/behavior interactions on the physical characteristics of the operant
itself.
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Define cross-tolerance, how it has been examined experimentally and how
it is understood mechanistically. Identify the conditions under which it
would be expected to occur, and those under which it should not occur.
Give examples from published studies.
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Describe two ways in which behavioral history influences the effects of
a drug. Be specific and use examples from the published literature.
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Describe some of the procedures that have been used to investigate drug
effects on learning and memory. Critically discuss those that have been
studied in human and nonhuman species. Summarize some of the drug effects.
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