Women may actually perform better in certain cognitive tasks during menstruation, according to a bold new study from University College London (UCL) and the Institute of Sport, Exercise & Health (ISEH).
Published in the peer-reviewed journal Neuropsychologia, this research is the first of its kind to explore sport-related cognition across different phases of the menstrual cycle.
The study assessed 241 participants who undertook a series of cognitive tests designed to simulate mental processes common in team sports. Tests included recognising smiling faces among winking ones (which measured inhibition), attention, reaction time and spatial cognition.
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Participants also tracked their menstrual cycles using period-tracking apps to determine which phase they were in during the tests.
Surprisingly, despite reporting feeling worse and anticipating poorer performance during menstruation, participants demonstrated quicker reaction times and made fewer errors.
For instance, in a task where they had to click when two moving balls collided, their timing was 10 milliseconds (12 per cent) more accurate on average during their periods.
Similarly, in the smiling or winking inhibition task, they pressed the space bar at the wrong time 25 per cent less often.
“What is surprising is that the participant’s performance was better when they were on their period, which challenges what women, and perhaps society more generally, assume about their abilities at this particular time of the month,” said Dr Flaminia Ronca, the study's lead author from UCL Division of Surgery and Interventional Science and ISEH.
Conversely, during the luteal phase – the period of 12-14 days between ovulation and menstruation – participants' reaction times were slower by 10-20 milliseconds compared to other phases, although their error rates did not increase.
As the authors pointed out, a variation of just 10 milliseconds can be the difference between sustaining a concussion or a lesser injury.
Dr Megan Lowery, another author of the study, said: “Though there’s a lot more research needed in this area, these findings are an important first step towards understanding how women’s cognition affects their athletic performance at different points during their cycle, which will hopefully facilitate positive conversations between coaches and athletes around performance and wellbeing”.
About the experts
Flaminia Ronca is an associate professor in the Department of Targeted Intervention, Division of Surgery and Interventional Science at UCL. Her principal research interests lie in the interaction between the body and the brain through exercise. Ronca also co-leads the Exercise Neuroscience Research Group (ENRG) at UCL.
Megan Lowery is a senior sports scientist and female athlete health specialist at Sports & Wellbeing Analytics. She previously worked as a PhD researcher with UK Sport at Bangor University where she examined the complex ways in which different pathway, individual and coaching factors affect athletes’ availability and ability to thrive in the high-performance sport environment.
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