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Abstract
Reports on habituation from the last part of the nineteenth and the first part of
this century are reviewed. Publications are selected according to their significance
for the understanding of the properties that characterize habituation. Reports that
have contributed to the establishment of a causative link between habituation and
synaptic depression are also reviewed. A kinetic analysis of experimental cases of
habituation is made for different reflexes in a number of species. The results of
the analysis indicate the existence of two distinct subcategories of habituation:
a slow and a fast version. Each category has a remarkably narrow range of kinetic
variability, regardless of species and type of reflex. In one particular reflex, the
tentacle withdrawal of Helix pomatia, both versions of habituation are displayed in
response to different stimulation paradigms. On the basis of the kinetic analysis,
a new criterion for identification of habituation is suggested.