Spatial Recognition in Cats: Effects of Parahippocampal Lesions

The role of the posterior parahippocampal area of the brain in spatial types of memory in conditions of one-trial visual perception of the positions of objects was studied by training eight cats to remember the spatial positions of either two different objects covering two of three feeders placed on a test tray (tests for the “object–place” association) or the positions of two of three feeders (tests for place). Each trial used new objects and new positions for the two of three feeders. After training, four cats were subjected to electrolytic lesioning of the posterior parahippocampal area, primarily the parahippocampal cortex, parasubiculum, and presubiculum; the remaining four cats underwent all the surgical procedures except electrocoagulation of nervous tissue; this was the sham-operated control group. Cats of this group showed no impairment to the performance of tests of both types, while the experimental group showed similar levels of impairment to the performance of both tests. Thus, memory for one-trial perception of “object–place” associations and, more simply, two different object places in cats were critically dependent on the posterior parahippocampal area.