What the rat's nose tells the rat's mouth: Long delay aversion conditioning with aqueous odors and potentiation of taste by odors

In Experiment 1, olfactory bulbectomized and control rats were trained using operant conditioning to determine the taste threshold of aqueous amyl acetate. Concentrations below gustatory threshold were used in Experiments 2-5 to compare the effectiveness of odors with various concentrations of saccharin as cues for illness. The results showed the following: (1) The effectiveness of odor and taste was directly related to concentration; (2) the strength of an aversion to a concentration of taste could be matched by an appropriate concentration of an odor; (3) odor was as effective as taste with CS-US delays of 4 h; and (4) an effective odor potentiated an aversion to an otherwise ineffective taste. The results challenge the privileged role accorded tastes in food aversion learning and the manner in which tastes are held to interact with odors according to the sensory-and-gate channeling analysis of potentiation (Rusiniak, Hankins, Garcia, & Brett, 1979).