Developmental Psychobiology

Greenberg, Gary; Partridge, Ty; Weiss, Emily; Pisula, Wojciech

doi: 10.1002/dev.10153pmid: 14704983

This article responds to the continuing obituaries for Comparative Psychology. We understand the field to be a general psychology, a way of understanding the origins of all behavior of all species. We outline a methodological and conceptual foundation for comparative psychology to enter the new millennium—with an anagenetic and dynamic systems perspective. We see an important role to be played by comparative psychologists in managing resources, increasing our activity in social and political issues, and transcending our traditional role as the study of animal behavior to one that makes significant contributions to psychology and humanity by studying relationships between animals and changing environments, and by providing a historical perspective on human evolution. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Dev Psychobiol 44: 1–15, 2004.

Moore, Celia L.

doi: 10.1002/dev.10155pmid: 14704984

The serious, comparative study of behavioral complexity that Greenberg et al. advocate is a progressive direction for the field, but their proposal to separate comparative psychology from its roots in evolutionary biology seems regressive. Modern evolutionary theory has been broadened within biology to include development and paleontology alongside natural selection, making closer integration with that discipline particularly timely. Such an integrated evolutionary approach in psychology would offer a useful alternative to the adaptationism popularized by evolutionary psychology. Although the differences between comparative psychologists and biologists may be blurred in the process, the behavioral sciences will be better served by a rich biological approach to evolution than by a uniquely psychological approach. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Dev Psychobiol 44: 16–20, 2004.

Denenberg, Victor H.

doi: 10.1002/dev.10156pmid: 14704985

Greenberg et al., in their perspective on the current state and fate of comparative psychology, present convincing data that the field is viable and that comparative psychologists are making important contributions to the research literature. The central feature of the field is its emphasis upon evolution. This is also its weakness since advances in genetic techniques permit researchers to create laboratory animals that have no counterpart in the natural world, and thus have no evolutionary history. These “unnatural” animals are widely used in behavioral, biological, and medical studies, but the findings cannot be interpreted within a comparative psychology framework. As the use of these preparations expand, the relevance of comparative psychology diminishes. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Dev Psychobiol 44: 21–25, 2004.

Lickliter, Robert

doi: 10.1002/dev.10157pmid: 14704986

Greenberg, Partridge, Weiss, and Pisula propose a new perspective of comparative psychology, based in large part on an anagenetic and dynamic systems approach to the development and evolution of behavior. Their view appreciates the probabilistic nature of behavioral development and promotes the value of an integrative levels concept for generating testable hypothesis regarding the complex relationship between biology, context, and developmental history underlying behavioral and psychological functioning. However, the authors fail to represent the full scope of contemporary comparative psychology by overlooking several core aims of the field, including (a) the use of animal models to shed light on human behavior and development and (b) understanding the role of behavior as a leading edge in the evolutionary process. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Dev Psychobiol 44: 26–30, 2004.

Greenberg, Gary; Partridge, Ty

doi: 10.1002/dev.10154pmid: N/A

Branchi, Igor; Santucci, Daniela; Puopolo, Maria; Alleva, Enrico

doi: 10.1002/dev.10150pmid: 14704988

Infant rodents emit ultrasonic vocalizations (USVs) when isolated from the mother and littermates. While USVs reportedly promote maternal behavior, their communicatory role is still controversial. We performed a detailed behavioral characterization in 7‐day‐old CD‐1 Swiss mice to describe (a) behavioral patterns accompanying or immediately preceding or following the USV and (b) how selected USV features are modulated according to the behavioral pattern being performed. The present results represent an ethogram of mouse pup behavior in close temporal proximity to USV, providing further information to evaluate the functional role of USVs in the framework of the mother–offspring relationship. A significant increase of head rising behavior immediately prior to the USV and a behavioral activation displayed by pups in conjunction with it suggest that pups behave in a way that may favor interaction with their mothers. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Dev Psychobiol 44: 37–44, 2004.

Nicholson, Daniel A.; Freeman, John H.

doi: 10.1002/dev.10149pmid: 14704989

The activity of neurons in the cerebellum exhibits learning‐related changes during eyeblink conditioning in adult mammals. The induction and preservation of learning‐related changes in cerebellar neuronal activity in developing rats may be affected by the level of maturity in cerebellar feedback to its brainstem afferents, including the inferior olive. Developmental changes in cerebellar plasticity were examined by recording the activity of Purkinje cells in eye regions of cerebellar cortical lobule HVI (lobulus simplex) in infant rats during eyeblink conditioning. The percentage and amplitude of eyeblink conditioned responses increased as a function of age. Analyses of Purkinje cell simple spike activity revealed developmental increases in the number of units that exhibited stimulus‐evoked and learning‐related changes in activity. Moreover, the magnitude of these changes exhibited a substantial age‐related increase. The results support the view that the emergence of learning‐specific cerebellar plasticity and the ontogeny of eyeblink conditioning are influenced by developmental changes in the synaptic interactions within brainstem–cerebellum circuits. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Dev Psychobiol 44: 45–57, 2004.

Holloway, Kevin S.; Suter, Robert B.

doi: 10.1002/dev.10151pmid: 14704990

Three experiments were conducted to control for the effects of housing conditions during play deprivation on subsequent play rebound in periadolescent rats. To address play deprivation without the confound of social isolation, in Experiment 1 pairs of subjects were housed either in cages divided by wire mesh that allowed for olfactory, visual, auditory, and tactile interactions with a same‐sex agemate but prevented rough and tumble play or in standard cages. Running wheels were provided to similarly housed subjects in Experiment 2 to control for the ability to engage in physical activity. In Experiment 3, standard and brooder cages were used to control for the effects of housing area. Play‐deprived subjects in all conditions showed a greatly increased number of play responses immediately following deprivation. The results from these experiments more clearly indicate that the absence of play is the crucial feature that brings about play rebound following deprivation. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Dev Psychobiol 44: 58–67, 2004.

Wolfe, Christy D.; Bell, Martha Ann

doi: 10.1002/dev.10152pmid: 14704991

This study examined the cognitive skills of working memory and inhibitory control (WMIC) in relation to physiological functioning, temperament, and language in early childhood. WMIC skills were assessed in twenty‐five 4½‐year‐old children using the day–night Stroop‐like task and the yes–no task; each task required the child to remember two rules and to inhibit a dominant response. Electroencephalogram (EEG) and heart period (HP) were recorded during baseline and WMIC tasks. An increase in 6‐ to 9‐Hz EEG power from baseline to task was found for the medial frontal region. In addition, a decrease in HP (i.e., an increase in heart rate) was found from baseline to task. Associations were found between performance on the WMIC tasks and scales of the Children's Behavioral Questionnaire (CBQ) related to the effortful control of behavior. The Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test‐III (PPVT‐III) distinguished between high and low WMIC performance. Results of a discriminant function analysis indicated that physiology, temperament, and language were able to correctly predict 90% of WMIC performance. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Dev Psychobiol 44: 68–83, 2004.

Tang, Akaysha C.; Reeb, Bethany C.

doi: 10.1002/dev.10158pmid: 14704992

Brief and transient early‐life stimulation via neonatal handling and neonatal novelty exposure can lead to differential changes within the right and left brains. In rats, these lateralized changes have been demonstrated behaviorally, neuroanatomically, and neurophysiologically. Recently, we found that neonatal novelty exposure can prolong the duration of social recognition memory from less than 2 hr to at least 24 hr among male rats reared in social isolation and that this enhancement is associated with an initial right‐turn preference in a novel testing cage. In contrast to stable forms of asymmetry, such as handedness, we show that this turning asymmetry is dynamic—decreasing as the animal adjusts to the novel testing environment over a 2‐day period. This change in turning asymmetry was found only among animals that experienced neonatal novelty exposure during the first 3 weeks of their lives. Furthermore, individual differences in short‐term social recognition memory for a conspecific can be predicted by this change in functional asymmetry. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Dev Psychobiol 44: 84–93, 2004.