Publications by authors named "David Dibattista"

Benford's Law describes the finding that the distribution of leading (or leftmost) digits of innumerable datasets follows a well-defined logarithmic trend, rather than an intuitive uniformity. In practice this means that the most common leading digit is 1, with an expected frequency of 30.1%, and the least common is 9, with an expected frequency of 4.

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In Experiment 1, golden hamsters were injected with either 0.9% saline or the nausea-inducing agent, lithium chloride (LiCL), immediately after consuming a flavored diet that was either novel or familiar. The LiCl-induced aversion was strong in hamsters for which the flavored diet was novel, but no significant aversion was observed in hamsters that were familiar with the flavored diet.

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In experimental conditions, golden hamsters (Mesocricetus auratus) avidly consume ethanol solutions. However, they are relatively resistant to the deleterious effects of ethanol even after months of continuous consumption, apparently because they metabolize ethanol rapidly and efficiently. Male hamsters with ad libitum access to food and water were presented with isocaloric solutions [weight/weight (wt.

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Although animals generally prefer to eat foods with familiar rather than unfamiliar flavors, adult golden hamsters (Mesocricetus auratus) were found to do the opposite. After having prolonged exposure to a food with a particular flavor, hamsters were allowed to select between the food with the familiar flavor and the same food with a novel flavor. Hamsters consistently ate more of the food with the novel flavor, and this preference was long-lasting and resistant to extinction.

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