Abstract
Ten London pigeons were tested in an operant apparatus, and found to have marked colour preferences, blue being preferred over green, followed by yellow and red. The effects of 2 tranquilizers, diazepam and chlorpromazine, were studied and it was found that diazepam released responding, and chlorpromazine suppressed it. Diazepam also tended to abolish colour preference, whilst chlorpromazine was effective only at the highest dose used (5.00 mg/kg). The implications of these findings, particularly in relation to the design of experiments and to the aversiveness of certain stimuli, are discussed.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Brown, P., Jenkins, J.: Autoshaping of the pigeons key peck. J. exp. Anal. Behav. 11, 1–8 (1968)
Crankshaw, D. P., Raper, C.: The effect of solvents on the potency of chlordiazepoxide, diazepam, medazepam and nitrazepam. J. Pharmac. Pharmacol. 23, 313–321 (1971)
Ferster, C. B., Skinner, B. F.: Schedules of reinforcement. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts 1957
Friedman, M.: A comparison of alternative tests of significance for the problems of m rankings. Ann. Math. Statist. 11, 86–92 (1940)
Hasegawa, Y., Ibuka, N., Iwahara, S.: Effects of chlordiazepoxide upon successive red-green discrimination responses in Japanese monkeys, macaca fuscata. Psychopharmacologia (Berl.) 30, 89–94 (1973)
Humphrey, N. K.: Colour and brightness preferences in monkeys. Nature (Lond.) 229, 615–617 (1971)
Jonckheere, A. R.: A test of significance for the relation between m rankings and k ranked categories. Brit. J. Statist. Psychol. 7, 93–100 (1954)
Margules, D. L., Stein, L.: Neuroleptics vs. tranquilizers: evidence from animal studies of mode and site of action. In: Neuro-Psychopharmacology, H. Brill, J. O. Cole, P. Deniker, H. Hippius, and P. B. Bradley, eds., pp. 108–120. Amsterdam: Excerpta Medica Foundation 1967
Morse, W. H.: Effect of amobarbital and chlorpromazine on punished behaviour in the pigeon. Psychopharmacologia (Berl.) 6, 286–294 (1964)
Mulvaney, D. E., Dinsmoor, J. A., Jwaideh, A. R., Hughes, L. H.: Punishment of observing by the negative discriminative stimulus. J. exp. Anal. Behav. 21, 37–44 (1974)
Siegel, S.: Nonparametric statistics. New York: McGrawHill 1956
Terrace, H. S.: Errorless discrimination learning in the pigeon: effects of chlorpromazine and imipramine. Science 140, 318–319 (1963a)
Terrace, H. S.: Discrimination learning with and without “errors”. J. exp. Anal. Behav. 6, 1–27 (1963b)
Terrace, H. S.: Stimulus control. In: Operant behaviour: Areas of research and application, W. K. Honig, ed., pp. 271–344. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts 1965
Thomas, D. R.: The use of operant conditioning techniques to investigate perceptual processes in animals. In: Animal discrimination learning, R. M. Gilbert and N. S. Sutherland, eds., pp. 1–33. New York: Academic Press 1969
Tracy, W. K.: Wavelength generalisation and preference in monotonically reared ducklings. J. exp. Anal. Behav. 13, 163–178 (1970)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Sahgal, A., Iversen, S.D. Colour preferences in the pigeon: A behavioural and psychopharmacological study. Psychopharmacologia 43, 175–179 (1975). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00421021
Received:
Issue date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00421021

