Enhancement of rats’ single-alternation performance by high food deprivation

Rats were trained in a straight alley with a single-alternation schedule of reward and nonreward under either high (11 g/day) or low (20 g/day) food deprivation. Ss under high deprivation were superior in patterning performance to those under low deprivation, the form of this result differing over segments of the alley. In the goal segment, the high-deprivation animali’ ran faster on rewarded trials than the low-deprivation animals, while in the start segment, the high-deprivation animals ran more slowly on nonrewarded trials than the low-deprivation animals. It was suggested that increasing food deprivation increases the reward value of food and the aversiveness of nonreward