Role of the Hippocampus in Classical Conditioning of Aversive and Appetitive Behaviors

In this chapter, we review several series of experiments that have investigated the relationship between hippocampal neuronal activity and classical conditioning of the rabbit nictitating membrane (NM) and jaw movement (CJM) responses. The rabbit NM and CJM preparations were developed by Gor-mezano in the 1960s (Gormezano et al, 1962; Smith et al., 1966) for analysis of the environmental determinants of behavior. The rabbit NM preparation was adapted by Thompson in the mid 1970s (Thompson et al., 1976) and the cjm preparation by Berry in the early 1980s (Berry and Oliver, 1982) for use with neurobiological techniques, and they represent examples of the increasing use of “model behavioral systems” in the study of the neural basis of learned behaviors.