Learning-Theoretical Aspects of Primary Dysmenorrhea

Abstract Women suffering from severe primary dysmenorrhea (PD) show a typical behaviour pattern characterized by flight, avoidance, inactivity and helplessness. The question is if there is a common mechanism of origin in all those individual women who display such PD behaviour. A learning-theoretical model is presented concerning the origin of the connection between the stimulus of menstruation and the response of PD behaviour in women with severe PD: — Women have an increased physiological arousal premenstrually and during menstruation. — Women have a tendency to label the increased arousal negatively for two reasons: (1) Because of negative attitudes towards menstruation acquired from the social environment. (2) Because women have a lack of knowledge about their genitals and their functions, there is a lack of correct labelling of menstruation. Inexplicable arousal is mostly labelled as something “wrong”. — The negatively labelled increased arousal pre- and intermenstrually leads to an increased recepti...