INTERHEMISPHERIC TRANSFER OF TACTILE CONDITIONED RESPONSES IN CORPUS CALLOSUM-SECTIONED CATS

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Abstract
Using an instrumental, shock -avoidance conditioning procedure, unoperated cats completely transfer limb flexion and respiratory responses conditioned to unilateral tactile stimulation. Pretraining section of the corpus callosum prevents transfer of both responses in the absence of shock reinforcement, but the respiratory response is rapidly relearned with great savings when reinforcement is reintroduced. The limb flexion response fails completely to transfer and must be relearned by the untrained forelimb in approximately the same number of trials as required by the initially-trained forelimb. These results suggest that highly-corticalized neural functions, such as forelimb flexion may be, require an intact corpus callosum to mediate interhemispheric transfer of learning.

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