Comparative Psychopharmacology: Animal Experimental Studies on the Effects of Drugs on Behavior.

Procedures, Problems and Perspectives in Animal Behavioral Studies of Drug Activity.

“…But limitations on time, manpower, and laboratory facilities restrict the completeness of a behavioral assay, even at the animal experimental level. Certainly, with the more traditional problem box and maze running approaches to psychopharmacological relationships (2), such a comparative assay laboratory would be ill-suited to provide very extensive behavioral profiles within the lifetime of most pharmacologists, much less the lifetime of most drugs.…”

A history of reinforcement: The role of reinforcement schedules in behavior pharmacology.

“…The potential value of steady-state operant behavior generated by schedules of reinforcement to measure the effects of psychoactive drugs was recognized as early as the late 1950's (Brady, 1959;Sidman, 1959). The notion of a behavioral baseline against which effects of drugs could be assessed was central to this early research, and to the research tradition that is traced in this paper.…”

A Discussion of the Relevance of Effects of Drugs on Animal Behavior to the Possible Effects of Drugs on Psychopathological Processes in Man.

“…behavior of the animal, while failing to impair various simpler forms of behavior. A number of studies of the effects of pharmacologic agents on the behavior of animals with conditioned emotional responses have, of course, been carried out; Brady (11) has reviewed these studies. How does the design of these studies compare with the design of the screening tests which are proposed in this paper?…”

“…A fourth obstacle to the predictive value of the behavioral effects of drugs in animals lies in the uncertainty with which one may extrapolate from animal to man. In considering this question, Brady (11) has pointed out that "Although there would seem to be little rational basis for more concern in this area than in any other biological realm involving extrapolations from one phylogenetic level to another, it might be well to emphasize the essentially empirical character of any assay approach of this kind." Of course, Brady is correct in maintaining that, a priori there is no more basis for objection to extrapolation to different phylogenetic levels in the field of behavior than in any other field; the validation of such extrapolations is, as he indicates, dependent upon an empirical approach in any field.…”