The expression of the ‘pre-menstrual syndrome’ in measures of mood and sustained attention

Abstract

Twenty-eight women performed two demanding sustained attention tasks in the premenstrual and intermenstrual phases of the menstrual cycle. Mood was assessed before and after performance. No effects of phase were found on perceptual sensitivity and response criterion, but response time on the less demanding of the two tasks was slower in the premenstrual phase. There were no effects of phase on pre-task mood, but following performance, premenstrual women were lower in energy and in pleasantness of mood. Moods varied with phase irrespective of usage of the contraceptive pill, but effects on response time were stronger in non-pill users. Performance data suggest that speed of visual discrimination varies with the cycle, but this finding is of little practical significance. The mood data suggest that the affective correlates of the cycle vary with situational stress, and, in the workplace, it may be desirable to reduce stress and workload during the premenstrual phase.

Sex and menstrual cycle influences on three aspects of attention

“…during the late luteal phase. Also in line with the results of the present study, Matthews and Ryan [ 29 ] report reduced performance on sustained attention tasks in the luteal cycle phase. Note however, that their findings concern response times rather than accuracy and were observed in the late luteal rather than the mid-luteal cycle phase.…”

“…Note however that they did not follow the same women along their menstrual cycle, but compared different women, who were at different time points in their menstrual cycle. Comparably, [ 29 ] report decreased performance during the late luteal/pre-menstrual phase compared to the pre-ovulatory phase (days 10-14), while Morgan et al [ 35 ] report no changes in sustained attention performance in the late luteal/premenstrual cycle phase. Regarding selective attention it has been demonstrated that sex differences in the processing of hierarchical stimuli are restricted to the luteal cycle phase, when progesterone levels are high [ 38 ].…”

Neuropsychological performance and menstrual cycle: a literature review

“…Golub, 1976 21 Slade & Jenner, 1980 20 Broverman et al, 1981 19 Hartley et al, 1987 18 Hampson, 1990 17 Lord & Taylor, 1991 14 Phillips & Sherwin, 1992 16 Gordon & Lee, 1993 13 15 Matthews & Ryan, 1994 12 Cockerill et al, 1994 11 Epting & Overman, 1998 10 Maki et al, 2002 9 Halari et al Neuropsychological performance and menstrual cycle -Souza et al…”

“…1,2 However, the results reported by studies focusing on the influence of the menstrual cycle on cognitive function are conflictive. 8 The main aim of the present study was to review in healthy women, [8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24] six assessed women with PMS, [25][26][27][28][29][30] and four articles assessed women with PMDD. [31][32][33][34] The neuropsychological functions assessed were different across studies and included verbal and non-verbal (Table 1).…”

“…The results reported suggest that hormonal changes have an impact on the cognitive performance of healthy women. 9,[12][13][14][15][16][17][18]20,24 In women with PMS and PMDD, cognitive complaints…”