Comparison of attention in females before and after puberty and during menopause

ObjectiveDue to the presence of estrogen and progesterone receptors in the brain this study is to evaluate the hypothesis that sexuality changes during the menstrual cycle and accompanied with aging in females have some effects on attention.Materials and methods17 immature-girls, 15 young-adult women with regular menstrual cycles and 17 postmenopausal-women were studied here. Cognitive tests of Stroop and ANT performed three times for young-adults at early follicular, ovulation and mid-luteal phases respectively and for both the immature-girls and postmenopausal-women only in one session. Serum levels of sex-related hormones were measured after each session.ResultsInterference scores of postmenopausal-women and immature-girls in the Stroop test were significantly higher than the young-adults in different phases. Function of alerting-network was significantly weaker for immature-girls than the other groups, however, in orienting-network; there weren't significant difference between the groups. Function of executive control network was significantly poorer in immature-girls and it was significantly better in mid-luteal phase of young-adults than in the others. The serum levels of progesterone, LH and FSH were significantly higher in the postmenopausal-women than the other groups. Serum levels of estradiol were significantly less in the immature-girls than the other groups.ConclusionsLow levels of estrogen in immature-girls maybe associated with reduced attention in the Stroop test and decreased performance of executive control network in the attentional network tests. Also, low levels of estrogen and high levels of LH and FSH in the post-menopausal women seems to have effects on the attention performance in the Stroop test.