The probe trial in a water maze test should not exceed two times

Abstract We performed two types of water maze tests (a visual-cued and an acoustic-cued) to determine the appropriate number of probe trials for a water maze test. Three probe trials were applied in the probe trial phase of each experiment. The observational indexes included the time of the first crossing and the number of crossing. In both types of the tests, the results showed that the time of the first crossing increased significantly from the second to the third probe trials (P < 0.05), while the number of crossing decreased significantly from the second to the third probe trials (P < 0.05). Meanwhile, the differences between the first and the second probe trials were not statistically significant regarding both the time of the first crossing and the number of crossing (both P > 0.05). Therefore, we believe that the number of probe trials in a water maze test should be one or two but no more than two times.