Response inhibition tasks require the subjects to inhibit responses that the organism may be naturally predisposed to perform in particular environments. For example, in rodents, passive avoidance is a task commonly used to show response inhibition. In these tasks, the rodent is placed in a box on a “safe” area, adjacent to a grid floor that will provide a shock if the animal steps onto the grid within a trial. The animal must learn to inhibit the natural tendency to explore new environments and remain on the “safe” side of the test chamber for the entire trial (see Figure 2 for a schematic). PNEE rats prenatally exposed to ethanol (liquid diet GD 6–16) show impairments in these passive avoidance tasks, at both PND 18 and PND 41–53 (228). In a large rat study, offspring exposed to ethanol (liquid diet GD 5–20) again exhibited impaired passive avoidance of a shock at both PND 17 and PND 48, but not at PND 114, and took longer to spontaneously alter their exploratory strategy on a T-maze where the animal would be confined after
