---
title: Does the menstrual cycle affect how well women remember emotional stories?
description: Women in the high-hormone luteal phase remember more extra details from emotional stories, while women in the low-hormone follicular phase show no difference
url: https://niyora.com/research/papers/sex-and-menstrual-cycle-phase-at-encoding-influence-emotional-memory-for-gist-2013/
---

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- Does the menstrual cycle affect how well women remember emotional stories?

Lab study, 2013

# Does the menstrual cycle affect how well women remember emotional stories?

Women in the high-hormone luteal phase remember more extra details from emotional stories, while women in the low-hormone follicular phase show no difference between emotional and neutral stories. Men remember the main plot better from emotional stories.

 Moderate study design

Healthy women (follicular and luteal phase) and men

## What they did

Healthy women and men watched a brief emotional or neutral story with three phases. One week later, they recalled what they remembered. Women were divided into two groups based on their menstrual cycle phase when they watched the story - low-hormone follicular or high-hormone luteal.

## What they found

Women in the luteal phase remembered more extra details from emotional stories compared to neutral stories. Women in the follicular phase showed no difference between emotional and neutral stories. Men remembered the main plot better from emotional stories but not extra details. Attention and arousal were similar across all groups.

## What it means for you

Hormones during the menstrual cycle may affect what women remember from emotional events. This is about memory in healthy women, not specifically about PMS or mood problems. The researchers measured whether differences came from paying more attention or being more aroused, and found that did not explain it. The main limitation is we don't know why this happens.

1

week delay before memory test

3

phases in the emotional story

## About the study

Original title Sex and menstrual cycle phase at encoding influence emotional memory for gist and detail Authors Nielsen SE, Ahmed I, Cahill L Journal Neurobiology of learning and memory Year 2013 Study design Lab study What was tested None Open access Yes Read the paper [doi.org/10.1016/j.nlm.2013.07.015](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nlm.2013.07.015)

## Topics

[Menstrual cycle and mood](https://niyora.com/research/topics/condition-cycle-mood/)[Cognition, concentration and memory](https://niyora.com/research/topics/symptom-cognition/)

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