Discriminated lever press avoidance conditioning in male and female rats

Discriminated lever press avoidance and step through passive avoidance conditioning were studied in male and female rats. In lever press avoidance female rats showed superior avoidance performance, less intertrial responding and shorter durations of leverholding than male rats. Castration of males tended to improve their avoidance performance, whereas ovariectomy had no effect. In passive avoidance more males than females showed an avoidance response. From these results it is concluded that aversive stimulation seems to elicit different behavior tendencies in male and female rats rendering males less prepared for active avoidance, but at the same time more prepared for passive avoidance conditioning. The data do not support the hypothesis that sex differences in activity underly the dimorphism in active and passive avoidance conditioning.