Abstract
We have studied the effect of feedback on escape -avoidance training as an immunization against learned helplessness created by inescapable and unpredictable shocks. In the first phase of the experiment, the rats were trained with predictable and controllable stimuli. The animals that achieved the criterium (level press in 80% of the trials during the last 10 trials with and RF-2 reinforcement schedule) were assigned at random to one of the five groups to perform helplessness training: one predictable and controllable (Group E), three unpredictable and uncontrollable (Group 1, Group I-S1 with stimulus feedback in all trials, and Group I-S2 with stimulus feedback in 50% of trials), and the control group (Group C). In the test phase. All groups were trained in predictable and controllable events (lever press RF-2). The groups E and I-S2 showed no differences in latency of response, but there were differences between these two groups and the others Group I showed the most latency of response and difference from the other groups. These results suggest that the effect of fedback at 50% more effectively modulates the effects of helplessness produced by unpreditable and inescapable shocks.
