A specific association between facial disgust recognition and estradiol levels in naturally cycling women

Journal article


Kamboj, Sunjeev K., Krol, Kathleen M. and Curran, H. V.. (2015). A specific association between facial disgust recognition and estradiol levels in naturally cycling women. PLoS ONE. 10(4), pp. 1 - 12. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0122311
AuthorsKamboj, Sunjeev K., Krol, Kathleen M. and Curran, H. V.
Abstract

Subtle changes in social cognition are associated with naturalistic fluctuations in estrogens and progesterone over the course of the menstrual cycle. Using a dynamic emotion recognition task we aimed to provide a comprehensive description of the association between ovarian hormone levels and emotion recognition performance using a variety of performance metrics. Naturally cycling, psychiatrically healthy women attended a single experimental session during a follicular (days 7–13; n = 16), early luteal (days 15–19; n = 14) or late luteal phase (days 22–27; n = 14) of their menstrual cycle. Correct responses and reaction times to dynamic facial expressions were recorded and a two-high threshold analysis was used to assess discrimination and response bias. Salivary progesterone and estradiol were assayed and subjective measures of premenstrual symptoms, anxiety and positive and negative affect assessed. There was no interaction between cycle phase (follicular, early luteal, late luteal) and facial expression (sad, happy, fearful, angry, neutral and disgusted) on any of the recognition performance metrics. However, across the sample as a whole, progesterone levels were positively correlated with reaction times to a variety of facial expressions (anger, happiness, sadness and neutral expressions). In contrast, estradiol levels were specifically correlated with disgust processing on three performance indices (correct responses, response bias and discrimination). Premenstrual symptoms, anxiety and positive and negative affect were not associated with emotion recognition indices or hormone levels. The study highlights the role of naturalistic variations in ovarian hormone levels in modulating emotion recognition. In particular, progesterone seems to have a general slowing effect on facial expression processing. Our findings also provide the first behavioural evidence of a specific role for estrogens in the processing of disgust in humans.

Year2015
JournalPLoS ONE
Journal citation10 (4), pp. 1 - 12
PublisherPublic Library of Science
ISSN1932-6203
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0122311
Scopus EID2-s2.0-84928920226
Open accessOpen access
Page range1 - 12
Publisher's version
License
Place of publicationUnited States of America
Permalink -

https://acuresearchbank.acu.edu.au/item/8792x/a-specific-association-between-facial-disgust-recognition-and-estradiol-levels-in-naturally-cycling-women

Download files

  • 44
    total views
  • 59
    total downloads
  • 4
    views this month
  • 2
    downloads this month
These values are for the period from 19th October 2020, when this repository was created.

Export as