Platform-based active avoidance (PBA) paradigm

Design · All designs
Evidence · 5 claims (5 for) · 1 study (1 causal), q3 · 1 of 1 report an effect size · 5 claims rest on one study

Description

The PBA paradigm is an operant defensive-learning task in which an auditory tone CS predicts a footshock US and mice avoid shock by moving onto a central platform safe zone within the first 5 s of CS onset. The authors developed it because it "eliminates appetitive reinforcement", letting animals learn "to avoid shock by moving onto a permanently available platform without any competing reward demands", thereby isolating threat-driven avoidance and defensive response selection from food-motivation confounds.

Design Implications

Context

Requirements

• A permanent safe zone (8 × 8 cm platform) continuously available in the operant chamber; an auditory CS (12 kHz, 50 dB) coterminating with a footshock US; trial-by-trial scoring of platform entry within the first 5 s of CS onset by an experimenter blind to shock intensity and group.

Constraints

• Continuous platform availability produces stay behaviour (conditioning stay rate: 46%; retention test stay rate: 15%), so passive occupancy must be separated from cue-evoked entries when interpreting avoidance learning.

Target Learners

• mice (CalcaCre/+ and C57BL/6J, approximately 3-6 months old)

Learning Goals

• cue-evoked active avoidance (stimulus-response associative learning)
• defensive response selection between passive and active strategies

Claims

• Pba 0 3 Ma Optimal Footshock Active Avoidance [+M]
• Freezing levels are negatively correlated with active avoidance performance across mice in the platform-based active avoidance paradigm [+W]
• Low footshock intensities (0.1-0.2 mA) yield weak avoidance learning in both CGRP-silenced and control mice [+W]
• CGRP silencing reduces freezing at high footshock intensities where control mice show significant increases in freezing [+W]
• Silencing CGRP neurons in the parabrachial nucleus does not impair active avoidance learning and expands successful avoidance to high footshock intensities [+W]

Related Designs

Examples

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Key Sources

• Hanny Hayeon Lee, Eul Han & Yong Sang Jo. (2026). CGRP inhibition in the PBN shifts defensive strategy from freezing to active avoidance in a platform-based active avoidance paradigm. npj Science of Learning. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41539-026-00453-3

Page metadata

Field	Value
type	design
id	pba-paradigm-platform-based-active-avoidance
title	Platform-based active avoidance (PBA) paradigm
description	The PBA paradigm is an operant defensive-learning task in which an auditory tone CS predicts a footshock US and mice avoid shock by moving onto a central platform safe zone within the first 5 s of CS onset.
status	review
generated	by process:settle-candidates on 2026-10-26
trust	unverified — no one has confirmed this page's content
sources	1 — hanny-hayeon-lee-2026

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