PMT prompts more shopping sprees

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Women are more likely to go on a spending spree that they later regret in the 10 days leading up to their period, a new study has found.

Retail therapy may be a way to cope with the negative feelings caused by the hormonal fluctuations of PMT.

Professor Karen Pine, a psychologist at the University of Hertfordshire, interviewed 443 women aged 18 to 50 about their spending patterns.

Two-thirds of the women who were in the last 10 days of their cycle said they had bought something on impulse. More than half had overspent by more than £25, and some by more than £250. Many regretted it afterwards.

Professor Pine told the BBC that spending was "less controlled, more impulsive and more excessive" for premenstrual women. The findings were most extreme in women with severe PMT.

"We are getting surges and fluctuations in hormones which affect the part of the brain linked to emotions and inhibitory control. So the behaviour we found is not surprising," said Professor Pine.

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Tuesday 31 March 2009

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