why does every article involving women and sex have to mention chocolate? not only do i not associate sex+food in any way (barf), i freakin hate chocolate.

I kind of find it far more interesting that our hormone fluctuations may help protect us against schizophrenia. That, I didn't know.

Imagine if all the money from all the studies about women and their cycles and hormones and cravings were put to a better use - say, curing cancer or Alzheimer's or even cramps...

The world would be a better place.

Well, there was this in the article:

"This demonstrates for the first time that female hormones affect the reward system in very specific ways during particular parts of the cycle,"

I'm sure that's pretty interesting to anyone interested in the neurochemistry of mood disorders. It's proof of a principle that could be applied in treatment of depression, for example. We knew there was an association, but now we know more specifics.

I guess I thought we already knew that and had linked the two, but I guess I was wrong.

I really thought this was already common knowledge... or maybe just common sense? Also, I agree with elektrodot that it's hilarious how there is apparently a journalistic rule that chocolate and sex must be connected in all articles about women.

The thing about women's hormones protecting against schizophrenia is interesting, though, I'd like to know more about that.

I know that every month there's a day when all I want is to have sex with Justin Timberlake - and when I look, it's the 14th day of my cycle. And every month there is a day when I swear that I am coming down with something because I feel so dreadful, and it always turns out to be the 27th day of my cycle. Go figure.

As a student currently studyng mood disorders and their relation to neurochemistry, I find a lot of this article to be half-true due to the hyperbolic paraphrasing many news articles give to medical studies. I'd like to take a closer look at the individuals studied, the demographic, their medical histories, etc. before I ever take a study that suggests a simple solution to such a multifaceted problem at face value. For instance, the numerous health highlights in the news that insist moderate drinking of alcohol extends the lifespan of an individual more than simply not drinking is based on studies that categorize many people in the "non-drinking" group as individuals who had to stop drinking due to health problems that arose from it. This effectively lowers the expected lifespan of non-drinkers and voila, you have a story. It may not seem like much of a deal, but it really does compromise the intent and sanctity of the study. The conclusion regarding women's increased enjoyment of sex during hormone fluxes can arguably be just as true for men, who also have fluctuations in testosterone levels (one of my favorite terms, "manstruating", grew out of this phenomenon). Hormone fluxes, upbringing, genetic pre-dispositions, and granted yes, biological sex all play a role in such findings but they need to stop making it sound like "Oh this explains ALL women" and instead illustrate how women and men manifest the same chemical properties in different (NOT superior/inferior) manners.

I did like this quote (bold mine):

"This demonstrates for the first time that female hormones affect the reward system in very specific ways during particular parts of the cycle," added Dr Berman, who went on to stress that the results did not mean that women are more emotional or vulnerable to hormones than men.

Go Dr. Berman?

The thing about women's hormones protecting against schizophrenia is interesting, though, I'd like to know more about that.

Posted by: coshea

The way I'd understood it - and I'm not an expert - is that women are less susceptible to genetically inherited diseases like schizophrenia because we have more genetic material to work with.
That stash of extra genes in the second leg on the second X gets us out of a lot of jams.

The thing about women's hormones protecting against schizophrenia is interesting, though, I'd like to know more about that. - Posted by: coshea

The way I'd understood it - and I'm not an expert - is that women are less susceptible to genetically inherited diseases like schizophrenia because we have more genetic material to work with.
That stash of extra genes in the second leg on the second X gets us out of a lot of jams.

happy_bunny: That's true with some recessive diseases (like color-blindness and hemophilia) that are located exclusively on the X chromosome. However, most inherited diseases (like schizophrenia, ADHD, psychopathy, etc.) likely involve more than one gene PLUS environmental factors, so the extra X chromosome is unlikely to help.

It's called the TORYgraph for a reason.