It was shown that bilateral lesions in either the anterior or posterior neocortex are followed by partial disruption of a previously acquired food reinforced bar-pressing habit. The second experiment, which included a control posterior lesion group, revealed that small posterior lesions resulted in a similar performance decrement. In addition, Ss with bilateral lesions in both anterior and posterior areas exhibited approximately twice the reduction in bar-pressing rate as found in Ss with lesions in only one area. It was suggested that amount of tissue damage irrespective of the specific lesion site is perhaps the critical factor in determining postoperative rate at this stage.
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