Correction to “Influence of context on extinguished appetitive conditioning in male and female rats” by Moriarty et al. (2025).

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Abstract

, 2025[Aug-Oct], Vol 139[4-5], 193-201; see record 2026-16533-001). Due to an editorial production error, the abbreviation "US" (unconditioned stimulus) was incorrectly changed to "United States." The online version of this article has been corrected. (The following abstract of the original article appeared in record 2026-16533-001.) Extinction is fundamental to adaptive behavior in that it allows organisms to alter previously conditioned behaviors based on the prevailing environmental contingencies. Extinguished responses, however, will renew when the conditioned stimulus is presented outside the extinction context. There has been some suggestion that renewal after extinction of appetitive conditioning is a sex-specific process, with only male rats showing renewal (e.g., Anderson & Petrovich, 2015, 2017, 2018). The purpose of the present experiments was to revisit the role of sex in appetitive renewal, in part because an earlier literature demonstrated renewal in experiments with only female rats (e.g., Brooks & Bouton, 1994). In three experiments, rats underwent appetitive Pavlovian conditioning in Context A, followed by extinction in Context B, and then within-subject renewal testing in both B and A. In Experiment 1a, renewal was present for both male and female rats. In Experiment 1b, the procedure included exposures to Context A during the extinction phase. Once again, renewal was observed in female rats. In Experiment 2, we assessed if cycling hormones contribute to renewal in female rats. To do so we compared intact female rats with ovariectomized female rats, and observed robust renewal in both groups. Our results support the notion that renewal is a general behavioral phenomenon, and is one reason why behavior change may be difficult to sustain (Bouton, 2014). (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

Fields of Study & Subjects

Memory and Neural Mechanisms Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on Behavior Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies

Publication details

Journal / source
Behavioral Neuroscience
Volume
140
Issue
1
Pages
63–63
Publication date
1 February 2026
Language
EN