The role of the optic cortex in the dog in the determination of the functional properties of conditioned reactions to light.

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Abstract
This report presents a logical and experimental analysis of the neural locus of retention, extinction, and second-order elaboration of conditioned reactions to light. Dogs were conditioned to respond to a light stimulus by flexion of the hind leg, and were then subjected to an operation in which the visual areas of the cerebral cortex were removed. The animals showed no significant loss in the retention of the conditioned response after operation. The resistance of the learned reaction to extinction increased significantly postoperatively. Inhibition, generalization of the light-response to a sound stimulus, and a second-order response to sound, based Upon the reaction to light, were observed in the operated animals. Since the operations eliminated the primary connections of the visual system with the cerebral cortex, it has been proved that the dynamic properties of these conditioned responses, that is, retention, extinction, generalization, and second-order association, are not determined primarily by the optic cortex or by its associative pathways or relations with other sensory and motor areas of the cortex. In general, the results prove that the reflex properties of the conditioned response to light are maintained at subcortical levels of the neural system.

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