WOMEN CHART EMOTIONS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXI, 20 November 1937, Page 2

WOMEN CHART EMOTIONS

INTIMATE SECRETS FOR SCIENCE

KING’S COLLEGE HOSPITAL RESEARCH

(By Air Mail—From A Special Correspondent)

LONDON, 16th October.

Questions which, in the opinion of heads of certain women's colleges and medical schools, no unmarried women should be asked were i; eluded in a secret questionnaire sent to 167 intellectual women by King’s College Hospital, London, scientific research workers.

Every day for six months those taking part indicated by means of agreed symbols each time they felt elated, inclined to cry, when they felt depressed, anxious, irritable, shy, friendly, critical and when they had headaches. They were also asked for more intimate details, and it was because or these questions that objections W'ere raised in some quarters.

The research set out to discover whether there is a rhythm in the emotional life of a woman.

Tiie questions were answered by 25 students, 25 teachers and research workers, 31 doctors, 21 secretaries and almoners, 17 nurses and welfare workers, 6 masseuses and games instructresses, 4 writers and journalists, 1 designer and 32 women engaged in household duties.

The ages of the women ranged from 20 to 47, and 110 of them were unmarried. Here are some of the things the women recorded: Tendency to cry, 598 entries; showing a definite rhythmic recurrence of the feeling. Irritability. 113 entries, showing less tendency to rhythm. Fatigue 3,520. Depression and fatigue together, 610.

Feelings of elation, 1221 (only 70 j per cent., of the women made entries i in this section—some of them twice a | day). ! Average of feelings o- elation and i happiness was once a fortnight, show- j ing a rhythmic recurrence of these feel- i ings. !

Linder some of the more intimate heads not sufficient women made entries to make statistical interpretation possible. r Between them the 167 women had 1.018 headaches in the six months. The research workers who carried out the investigation do not regard it as necessarily typical of all women, pointing out that such a questionnaire was only suitable for women above a certain standard of intelligence. The conclusion is drawn that a good deal of women's emotional life is subject to definite cycles, but that this docs not necessarily apply to the whole of their feelings.