The ability of rats to learn the location of food when motivated by thirst—an experimental reply to Leeper.

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Abstract
The present investigation was designed to evaluate experimentally Leeper''s criticism of the studies by Spence and Lippitt and by Kendler. Albino rats, under thirst motivation, were subjected to a single-choice T-maze situation in which an inverted tray holding 5 glasses was in each goal box; one glass in each tray contained water while the remaining 4 glasses on one side contained food and the extra 4 glasses in the other goal box remained empty. During the training series, which lasted 7 days, the subjects were subjected to 4 daily trials (2 free-choice and 2 forced). Since the position of the glass containing water varied in an irregular fashion, the animals were forced to ''perceive discriminatingly'' the contents of the glass containers in each goal box. Because both spatial responses were rewarded, the time intervals between the perceptions of the choice point and the contents of both goal boxes were approx. equal. Therefore, according to Leeper, a cognition of the location of the unwanted goal object (food) should have been formed during the training series. The results of the test series, during which the animals were hungry, do not support Leeper''s preceptual theory.

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