Effects of cocaine, chlordiazepoxide, and chlorpromazine on responding of squirrel monkeys under second-order schedules of IM cocaine injection or food presentation

Abstract

Lever pressing by squirrel monkeys was maintained under second-order schedules of either food presentation or IM cocaine injection. Under one second-order schedule, every tenth response produced a brief (1-s) visual stimulus and the first brief stimulus presented after 30 min had elapsed was followed either by ten 300 mg food pellets or by a 3.0 mg IM injection of cocaine. Under another second-order schedule, the first response after 3 min produced the brief stimulus and the tenth brief stimulus was followed either by food or by cocaine. The two types of second-order schedules generated distinctly different patterns of responding. Furthermore, the temporal distribution of responding maintained by food presentation or cocaine injection sometimes differed slightly under the same schedule. Food presentation or cocaine injection occurred only at the end of each daily session, thereby allowing assessment of the effects of presession administration of cocaine, chlorpromazine (CPZ), and chlordiazepoxide (CDP) on responding at times when the direct effects of consequent cocaine injections were minimal or absent. Presession treatment with suitable doses of cocaine increased low rates of food- or cocaine-maintained responding under both types of second-order schedules, whereas CPZ only decreased responding. CDP increased responding in some monkeys, whereas in other monkeys it had little or no effect. Individual differences in the effects of CDP were not related to the schedule of reinforcement, the maintaining event, or the control rate of responding. Thus, the behavioral effects of cocaine, CDP, and CPZ were largely independent of whether responding was maintained by food or by cocaine.