Prof. Charles Abramson

Oklahoma State University

Prof. Charles Abramson

Oklahoma State University

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Academic Career Length

50Years (1977-Present)

(Calculated once Scilit publication data is synced: current year − year of first publication + 1)

Representative Publications

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1 January 2013 in Journal of Apicultural Research

Journal Article

Standard methods for behavioural studies ofApis mellifera

Ricarda Scheiner

Charles Abramson

Robert Brodschneider

Karl Crailsheim

Walter M. Farina

Ronald Thenius

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30 September 2011 in PLOS ONE

Journal Article

Dopamine and Octopamine Influence Avoidance Learning of Honey Bees in a Place Preference Assay

Maitreyi Agarwal

Manuel Giannoni Guzmán

Carla Morales-Matos

Rafael Alejandro Del Valle Díaz

Charles Abramson

Tugrul Giray

Biogenic amines are widely characterized in pathways evaluating reward and punishment, resulting in appropriate aversive or appetitive responses of vertebrates and invertebrates. We utilized the honey bee model and a newly developed spatial avoidance conditioning assay to probe effects of biogenic amines octopamine (OA) and dopamine (DA) on avoidance learning. In this new protocol non-harnessed bees associate a spatial color cue with mild electric shock punishment. After a number of experiences with color and shock the bees no longer enter the compartment associated with punishment. Intrinsic aspects of avoidance conditioning are associated with natural behavior of bees such as punishment (lack of food, explosive pollination mechanisms, danger of predation, heat, etc.) and their association to floral traits or other spatial cues during foraging. The results show that DA reduces the punishment received whereas octopamine OA increases the punishment received. These effects are dose-dependent and specific to the acquisition phase of training. The effects during acquisition are specific as shown in experiments using the antagonists Pimozide and Mianserin for DA and OA receptors, respectively. This study demonstrates the integrative role of biogenic amines in aversive learning in the honey bee as modeled in a novel non-appetitive avoidance learning assay.

1 January 1991 in Journal of Comparative Psychology

Journal Article

Conditional withholding of proboscis extension in honeybees (Apis mellifera) during discriminative punishment.

Brian H. Smith

Charles Abramson

Thomas R. Tobin

Proboscis extension conditioning of honeybee workers was used to test the ability of bees to respond to appetitive and aversive stimuli while restrained in a harness that allows subjects to move their antennae and mouthparts (Kuwabara, 1957; Menzel, Erber, & Masuhr, 1974). Subjects were conditioned to discriminate between two odors, one associated with sucrose feeding and the other associated with a 10 V AC shock if they responded to the sucrose unconditioned stimulus (US) in the context of that odor. Most Ss readily learned to respond to the odor followed by sucrose feeding and not to the odor associated with sucrose stimulation plus shock. Furthermore, in the context of the odor associated with shock, significantly more subjects withheld or delayed proboscis extension on stimulation with the sucrose US than they did in the context of the odor associated with feeding. Thus, restrained honeybees can readily learn to avoid shock according to an odor context by withholding proboscis extension to a normally powerful releaser. Analysis of individual learning curves revealed that subjects differed markedly in performance on this task. Some learn the discrimination quickly, whereas others show different kinds of response patterns.

31 March 2016 in Frontiers in Psychology

Journal Article

Learning in Plants: Lessons from Mimosa pudica

Charles Abramson

Ana M. Chicas-Mosier

This article provides an overview of the early Mimosa pudica literature; much of which is in journals not easily accessible to the reader. In contrast to the contemporary plant learning literature which is conducted primarily by plant biologists, this early literature was conducted by comparative psychologists whose goal was to search for the generality of learning phenomena such as habituation, and classical conditioning using experimental designs based on animal conditioning studies. In addition to reviewing the early literature, we hope to encourage collaborations between plant biologists and comparative psychologists by familiarizing the reader with issues in the study of learning faced by those working with animals. These issues include no consistent definition of learning phenomena and an overreliance on the use of cognition. We suggested that greater collaborative efforts be made between plant biologists and comparative psychologists if the study of plant learning is to be fully intergraded into the mainstream behavior theory.

1 September 2013 in Anthrozoös

Journal Article

The Relationship between Personality Match and Pet Satisfaction among Dog Owners

Lisa A. Curb

Charles Abramson

James W. Grice

Shelia M Kennison

We investigated the extent to which personality match between dog and owner is related to pet satisfaction. Prior research shows that owners relinquish dogs at a high rate, not only in the United States, but also in other countries. New procedures to match owners to future pets could reduce the problem of homeless pets. These were developed after examining the literature to determine all possible traits in dogs and conducting structured interviews to check for further traits. After doing this, 45 traits were determined, and two surveys were created. One survey assessed the personality traits of the dog, and the other assessed the owner's personality traits. In our study, 88 dog owners were asked to report their satisfaction with their self-selected dog and to describe their dog's personality characteristics, based on eight dimensions. Correlations between dog satisfaction scores and dog–owner personality match revealed four characteristics that were significantly associated with satisfaction: tend...

7 December 2017 in Oecologia

Journal Article

Plants learn and remember: lets get used to it

Monica Gagliano

Charles Abramson

Martial Depczynski

About Me

Charles I. Abramson has spent his lifetime investigating the similarities and differences in the behavior of animals. He is one of the few comparative psychologists in the world who has investigated over 20 different species of invertebrate and vertebrate animals in both applied and basic research questions. Dr. Abramson received all his degrees at Boston University, including his PhD in psychology in 1986, where he earned Phi Beta Kappa honors as an undergraduate student. Following his doctorate, he was a research professor of biochemistry at Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn, NY, and moved to the psychology department of Oklahoma State University in 1993. He is considered one of the top 60 teaching psychologists in the United States, having earned a national teaching award from the American Psychological Association and a national book award from the Washington Educational Press, as well as the Oklahoma State University Regents Teaching Award, Regents Research Award, and Regents Professor title. He has received state honors from the Oklahoma Psychological Society five times and earned the Oklahoma Foundation for Excellence in teaching medal for Research University Teaching. His teaching and research contributions also extend internationally. He has been recognized three times for his contributions by Brazilian universities. Because of his work in Brazil, Colombia, and Venezuela, in 2016, he was elected to the Colombian Academy of Exact, Physical and Natural Sciences.

Prof. Charles Abramson

Prof. Charles Abramson

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About Me