• Hormonal Shopping

  Posted Thursday, April 02, 2009 12:28 PM | By Emily Yoffe
  
  
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  Meghan, Dayo, Dahlia, the study that purports to show that when women are premenstrual they tend to spend more impulsively sounds like so many of the other specious findings of evolutionary psychology about how women behave during different phases of their hormonal cycle. These researchers seem obsessed with proving that female humans, like other female mammals, actual experience estrus, or go into "heat." They can't stand that that human female ovulation is hidden, and as a result are obsessed with finding clues to female behavior (shopping sprees, dressing more provocatively) to prove that we are actually controlled by our hormones. It doesn't seem to matter that their research (and the silliness of some of these "experiments" is epic) often proves nothing; they always conclude it proves their case. I find the case, however, rather insidious. How is it different from the arguments of a generation ago that women are just too emotional, irrational, and controlled by their hormones to actually be in positions of power? Think of all the women teachers, co-workers, bosses you've had over the years. Have you ever actually been able to tell where any of them is in their menstrual cycle by their behavior? And think of their male equivalents. Is anyone doing research to explain why they seem rational some days and nuts on others? 
  
  Filed under: evolutionary psychology, shopping, menstruation, spending habits, hormones
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