Dendrites and cognition: A negative pilot study in the rat

doi:10.1016/0160-2896(95)90012-8

Intelligence

Volume 20, Issue 3, May–June 1995, Pages 291-308

https://doi.org/10.1016/0160-2896(95)90012-8 Get rights and content

Abstract

The dendritic structure of layer II–III pyramidal neurons of the parietal cortex in 41 Long-Evans rats was compared to behavioral assessments of attention to novelty, response flexibility, and reasoning. It was demonstrated that dendritic arborization is an individually consistent and interindividually variable feature of an individual rat's neurons. However, a significant correlation between dendritic arborization and behavioral performance was not demonstrated. Despite the failure to show a behavior-structure correlation in this particular study, the use of animal research has potential for evaluating the biology of neural structure from an orientation useful to individual difference research as shown by the demonstration that dendritic arborization is an individually consistent feature.

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Signs of a Flynn effect in rodents? Secular differentiation of the manifold of general cognitive ability in laboratory mice (Mus musculus) and Norwegian rats (Rattus norvegicus) over a century—Results from two cross-temporal meta-analyses
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Some recent data indicate that GCAs are (to a limited degree) translatable between different species (of, e.g., primates) evaluated using a common behavioral-psychometric assessment framework (for different approaches to addressing this issue, see Kaufman, Reynolds, & Kaufman, 2019; Woodley of Menie & Peñaherrera-Aguirre, 2022). Crinella and Yu (1995) argued that the apparently weak GCA factor in their study of unlesioned rats, relative to Anderson's (1993, 1995) findings of such a factor, may in part be a function of the use of different strains (specifically Long-Evans vs. Sprague-Dawley), controlling for strain (by modeling it as a random effect) did not eliminate heterogeneity in GCA variance in either the mouse or rat experimental populations. Moreover, no direct evidence was found for a significant difference between these two strains when GCA variance was (re)extracted from the relevant correlation matrices (see Fig. 7).7
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The Evolution of Consciousness in Animals
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The problem of an objective definition of consciousness increases several orders of magnitude when trying to recognize the physical basis of consciousness and the existence of conscious entities different from human beings. A viewpoint proposes that consciousness appeared in response to the need to develop a central control taking behavioral decisions based on motivational, sensory-spatial, and motor circumstances. To make such a decision, the organism should distinguish the sensory changes produced in the environment from those produced as a consequence of its own behavioral output. Some animals can such distinctions only using peripheral controls, while in animals with multiple spatial senses (vision, audition, olfaction, somesthesis) a central unification in form of central motor control is needed to produce a multisensory representation of the environment. A different viewpoint has been proposed, postulating that consciousness is the evolutionary result of sensation, and therefore retains the properties of sensation, that is, quality, intensity, affectivity, and duration. This review tries to develop an evolutionary tree of consciousness. It first discusses which adaptive advantage animals have acquired by consciousness. Behavior of sufficient complexity to consider the existence of consciousness could be found in three groups: arthropods, mollusks and vertebrates. The chapter analyzes the question on the adaptability of consciousness, provides a summary on the empirical proofs supporting (or rejecting) the existence of consciousness in the arthropods and mollusks is provided, examines the existence of consciousness in vertebrates.
Brain mechanisms and intelligence. Psychometric g and executive function
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Sternberg [Sternberg, R.J. (1985). Beyond IQ: a triarchic theory of human intelligence. New York: Cambridge Univ. Press.] has proposed that the general intelligence, or the g factor, obtained when batteries of mental tests are factor analyzed, is a reflection of the fact that executive functions (EF) are common to all cognitive tests. Three lines of evidence that fail to support Sternberg's formulation are presented. First, in animal problem solving studies, there is only a modest degree of overlap between brain structures that are critical for g, and brain structures that have been identified as the rodent EF system. Second, children with attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), characterized by EF dysfunction, do not have IQ scores that are lower, on average, than children in the test standardization populations. Third, human frontal lobe patients often have clear EF deficits, but IQ (a next-best estimate of g) may be preserved. These findings cast serious doubt on the plausibility of Sternberg's formulation. Clarifying the distinction between psychometric g and EF can be important for understanding the differences between practical and psychometric intelligence.
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^☆: This work was supported by the UAB Alzheimer's Disease Center.

^∗: The author wishes to thank Valisa Rutledge for superb technical support.

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Dendrites and cognition: A negative pilot study in the rat☆

Abstract

Neuroscience Letters

Personality and Individual Differences

Personality and Individual Differences

Brain Research Bulletin

Brain Research

Experimental Neurology

Experimental Neurology

Physiology and Behavior

Behavioral Brain Research

Brain Research

Personality and Individual Differences

Toxicology and Applied Pharmacology

Intelligence

Intelligence

Intelligence

Progress in Neurobiology

Physiology and Behavior

Intelligence

Intelligence

Intelligence

Personality and Individual Differences

Intelligence

Open-field and response-flexibility measures in the rat

Psychobiology

Rat reasoning: A reliability and validity study

Psychobiology

Naltrexone (NTX) ameliorates the behavioral consequences of methylazoxy-methanol (MAM)-induced microcephaly

Neurology

Intelligence and brain structure in normal individuals

American Journal of Psychiatry

The rat. A study in behavior

Recombinant-inbred strains: General methodological considerations relevant to the study of complex characteristics

Behavior Genetics

Intellectual abilities

Covariations between hippocampal mossy fibres and working and reference memory in spatial and non-spatial radial maze tasks in mice

European Journal of Neuroscience