![]() It is unclear as to whether rates differ by race. Yet the DSM-5 states, paradoxically, that “premenstrual dysphoric disorder is not a culture-bound syndrome and has been observed in individuals in the United States, Europe, India, and Asia. Estimates of the number of women afflicted ranged from 5 percent to 95 percent.Īs noted above, neither PMS nor PMDD occur in most cultures quite as they do in ours, if they occur at all. If any of these symptoms were to occur in the second half of the menstrual cycle, one could be diagnosed with PMS. She called it premenstrual syndrome and soon symptoms grew to include: anxiety, sadness, moodiness, constipation or diarrhea, feeling out of control, insomnia, food cravings, increased sex drive, anger, arguments with family or friends, poor judgment, lack of physical coordination, decreased efficiency, increased personal strength or power, feelings of connection to nature or to other women, seizures, convulsions, asthma attacks, flare-ups in asthma, allergies, sinusitis, anxiety disorders, irritable bowel syndrome, migraines, and multiple sclerosis. Then in 1953, British physician Katharina Dalton elaborated on this, arguing the condition came from fluctuation of estrogen and progesterone. Again, the cause was located in the uterus. He published an article titled, “The Hormonal Causes of Premenstrual Tension.” Frank described symptoms that occurred in the week before menstruation: irritability, bloating, fatigue, depression, attacks of pain, nervousness, restlessness, and the impulse for “foolish and ill considered actions,” due to ovarian activity. In 1931, however, an American gynecologist named Robert Frank revived the idea in a new guise. In 1908, at the meeting of the Societé de Neurologie in Paris, Joseph Babinski argued that hysteria was “the consequence of suggestion, sometimes directly from a doctor, and more often culturally absorbed.” Today, hysteria is never diagnosed, except by unwise husbands. But by the early 1900s, medical theories around “hysteria” were beginning to crumble. Cures included marriage and intercourse, which supposedly worked. In our own culture, the underlying idea behind PMS can be traced back 2,500 years to Hippocrates, the father of Western medicine, who believed that certain moods and physical disorders in women were caused by “hysteria” or the “wandering uterus,” meaning the organ literally drifted around the body, pulled by the moon, lodging in wrong places, blocking passages, causing pressures. American women do not report cold sensitivity and Chinese women rarely report negative affect. Data collected from women in Hong Kong and mainland China indicate that the most commonly reported premenstrual symptoms are fatigue, water retention, pain, and increased sensitivity to cold. World Health Organization surveys indicate that menstrual cycle-related complaints (except cramps) are most likely to be reported by women who live in Western Europe, Australia, and North America. “One of the most striking results,” they wrote, “was that PMS discourse has gained such cultural currency that women often expect to have PMS.” Another study found that patients “firmly believed that PMS is biologically based, and they rejected situational attributions for their distress.” In another experiment, women who were misled to believe they were premenstrual experienced more symptoms of PMS than those who were actually premenstrual but who were misled to believe they were not.Īccording to Joan Chrisler and Paula Caplan in their overview of the history of PMS: Researchers Lisa Cosgrove and Bethany Riddle found that women who endorsed traditional gender roles experienced more menstrual distress. Others have elaborated on PMS’s problematic nature as an evidence-based biological condition. And on the other we assume the causes of “cultural syndromes” are entirely mental, despite the fact that one’s beliefs and expectations about a condition can generate many of the same physical symptoms. One the one hand, we assume the causes of PMS are purely biological, despite not having found the mechanisms. ![]()
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