Women's intercollegiate athletic competition: Cortisol, testosterone, and the dual-hormone hypothesis as it relates to status among teammates

Salivary testosterone and cortisol are jointly related to pro-environmental behavior in men

“…In several studies, high testosterone was positively associated with indicators of aggressive or dominant behavior only in subjects with low cortisol Edwards & Casto, 2013;Mehta & Josephs, 2010;Pfattheicher et al, 2014;Popma et al, 2007). Furthermore, one recent study found a negative relationship between testosterone and self-reported empathy exclusively among individuals with low cortisol.…”

“…Yet other studies did not examine both types of effects, but focused exclusively on either interactions Edwards & Casto, 2013;Popma et al, 2007;Tackett et al, 2014) or ratios (Hermans et al, 2008). Also, the statistical properties of ratios have often not been taken into account appropriately, which may have biased the results in some cases (cf.…”

“…For example, basal testosterone has been shown to be positively associated with aggression (Dabbs, Jurkovic, & Frady, 1991;Popma et al, 2007), dominance (Mehta & Josephs, 2010), testosterone rise in response to winning a competition (Zilioli & Watson, 2012), social status within a women's athletic team (Edwards & Casto, 2013), antisocial punishment (Pfattheicher, Landhäußer, & Keller, 2014), and risk-taking behavior (Mehta, Welker, Zilioli, & Carré, 2015) exclusively when cortisol levels were low. Conversely, in subjects with high cortisol the relationship between testosterone and aggressive or dominant behavior was non-existent Edwards & Casto, 2013;Pfattheicher et al, 2014;Popma et al, 2007), or even reversed (Mehta & Josephs, 2010). In addition, and of particular importance for the current hypotheses, one recent study found a reversed testosterone x cortisol interaction effect on self-reported empathy as a positive social behavior (Zilioli, Ponzi, Henry, & Maestripieri, 2014).…”

Self-reported Dominance in Women: Associations with Hormonal Contraceptive use, Relationship Status, and Testosterone

“…For example, Edwards and Casto (2013) found a relationship between dominance and testosterone, but only in women with relatively low cortisol. Mehta and Josephs (2010) documented a similar moderating effect of cortisol on the relationship between testosterone and social dominance in their earlier work.…”

Testosterone Is High among Young Black Men with Little Education

“…Males produce far higher levels of T than females, their relevant organs are different, and T plays different roles in the development of each sex from the embryonic stage onward. Nonetheless, it remains uncertain whether the relationship between T and dominance is primarily a male mechanism or works in females too (e.g., Carré et al, 2013;Edwards and Castro, 2013). In the present study, at least, the sexes differ because the very high T seen among young black men with low education does not occur among young black women with low education.…”