Auditory thresholds in the guinea pig: a preliminary report of a behavioral technique employing a food reward.

Guinea pigs have been trained to press a lever for a food reward. Then the behavior was used to obtain the auditory thresholds for six guinea pigs. The thresholds obtained in the present study agree with those previously obtained by Heffner, et al. The most important aspect of the training process was the habituation of the guinea pigs. Once the guinea pig was accustomed to the food and training cage, he could be trained in a manner similar to that used to train many other species.