Passive Avoidance Learning

Synonyms

Fear learning; Inhibitory avoidance; Passive avoidance conditioning; Punishment

Definition

Passive avoidance involves an organism learning to withhold a certain behavior in order to postpone or avoid an aversive event.

Introduction

Learning to avoid harmful events, stimuli, or places has clear adaptive value and is ubiquitous across the animal kingdom. Experimentally, avoidance involves a subject learning that a specific behavioral response will result in the postponement or avoidance of an undesirable event. Avoidance behavior is most commonly evaluated using either active or passive avoidance conditioning paradigms. In the active form, the aversive event is avoided by performing a specific response, while in the passive form the aversive event is avoided through the suppressionof a specific response. The response to be performed or suppressed (the conditioned response [CR]) is typically one that the animal normally performs. In this case, the task is for the animal to...