Hormones and behavior

Millions of people take hormonal contraceptives (HCs), often starting during adolescence when ovarian hormones influence brain and behavioral maturation. However, there is a fundamental lack of information about the neurobehavioral conseque…

Although the menopausal transition causes a panoply of unpleasant and disruptive symptoms, many women are reluctant to use estrogen-based treatments due to risks of cancer, cardiovascular disease, and stroke. As we learn more about how estr…

In rodents, eating at atypical circadian times, such as during the biological rest phase when feeding is normally minimal, reduces fertility. Prior findings suggest this fertility impairment is due, at least in part, to reduced mating succe…

It is widely known that GnRH plays a role in facilitating reproductive function via the HPG axis, and this was once believed to be its only function. However, over the last several decades important neuromodulatory roles of GnRH in multiple…

Humans have disproportionately affected the habitat and survival of species through environmental contamination. Important among these anthropogenic influences is the proliferation of organic chemicals, some of which perturb hormone systems…

Hippocrates attributed women's high emotionality - hysteria - to a 'wandering womb'. Although hysteria diagnoses were abandoned along with the notion that displaced wombs cause emotional disturbance, recent research suggests that elevated l…

Phthalates, a ubiquitous class of environmental chemicals, may interfere with typical reproductive hormone production both in utero and in adulthood. Although they are best known as anti-androgens, increasingly, evidence suggests that phtha…

A historical perspective on estradiol's enhancement of cognitive function is presented, and research, primarily in animals, but also in humans, is reviewed. Data regarding the mechanisms underlying the enhancements are discussed. Newer stud…

A rat model of endometriosis, in which pieces of uterine horn (versus fat in controls) are autotransplanted into the abdomen where they form cysts, reduces fecundity and produces vaginal hyperalgesia. The cysts gradually enlarge over a 2-mo…