The appetitively motivated “cognitive” holeboard: A family of complex spatial discrimination tasks for assessing learning and memory

► We describe the concepts and procedures of testing in spatial holeboard tasks. ► Holeboard tasks allow studying multiple aspects of (non-)cognitive behavior. ► We summarize the effects of experimental manipulations using these tasks. ► The tasks have been used in a broad range of species, including humans. ► Holeboard-type tasks are expected to possess a large translational value.