Latent Effects of Chronic Whole-Body Irradiation Upon the Performance of Monkeys on the Spatial Delayed-Response Problem

Abstract

Eight normal, 13 low-dose irradiated, and 13 high-dose irradiated rhesus monkeys were tested for 24 trials a day over a 16-day period on a 10-second delayed-response problem. Previous delayed-response testing had failed to differentiate these groups during the first 100 days following the radiation exposure to which the experimental animals had been subjected two years prior to the initiation of the present experiment. The results of the present experiment demonstrated that the hypothesis of a facilitation of delayed-response performance by monkeys as a latent effect of whole-body irradiation is tenable. Normal monkeys can and do perform as efficiently at some points in time as chronic irradiated monkeys, but they appear to suffer interference from stimulus factors extraneous to solution of the problem at hand. (auth)