Tail pinch vs. cervical probing: Opposite effects upon intracranial reinforcement in female rats

Tail pinch, that is, the application of mild pressure to the base of a rat’s tail for a brief period, has been shown to facilitate a variety of dopamine (DA) dependent motivated behaviors, among them feeding, sexual activity, and intracranial reward (intracranial self-stimulation, ICS). Antelman, Caggiula, and their co-workers have presented a theory of nigro-neostriatal function in which tail pinch and cervical probing, a procedure consisting …