Instrumental learning of heart rate changes in curarized rats: Shaping, and specificity to discriminative stimulus.

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Abstract
Artificially respirated rats with skeletal muscles completely paralyzed by curare were rewarded by electrical stimulation of the medial forebrain bundle for either increasing or decreasing their heart rates. After achieving the easy criterion of a small change, they were required to meet progressively more difficult criteria for reward. Different groups learned increases or decreases, respectively of 20%; 21 of 23 rats showed highly reliable changes. The electrocardiogram indicated that decreased rates involved vagal inhibition. Rats learned to respond discriminatively to the stimuli signaling that cardiac changes would be rewarded.