Phencyclidine disturbs relational memory in the transitive inference task.
Katarzyna Fijal, Piotr Popik
Behavioural Pharmacology June 2011 DOI: 10.1097/fbp.0b013e328345c842 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Experimental animal study Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Population | Well-trained rats |
| Intervention | Phencyclidine (PCP) |
| Dose | 2.5 mg/kg for 5 days |
| Duration | 5 days of administration; testing 3 and 10 days after the last dose |
| Measures | transitive inference judgment |
| Key findings | Subchronic PCP (2.5 mg/kg for 5 days) impaired transitive inference in well-trained rats when tested 3 days after the last dose, but not 10 days after, indicating a transient cognitive effect. The authors argue this supports PCP as a model of cognitive domains affected in schizophrenia. |
Abstract
Transitive inference, that is, the ability to infer relationships among stimuli that are only indirectly associated, is impaired in schizophrenic patients and in rats with lesions of the prefrontal cortex. Symptoms of schizophrenia can be pharmacologically modeled by administration of the N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor antagonist, phencyclidine (PCP). Here, a subchronic administration of PCP (2.5 mg/kg for 5 days) to well-trained rats impaired the subsequent transitive inference judgment; the effect was observed 3 days, but not 10 days after the last dose. These results support the findings showing that PCP administration impairs cognitive domains specifically affected in schizophrenia in addition to mimicking the 'positive' and 'negative' symptoms of the disorder.