Women's monthly hormones affect shopping

HATFIELD, England, March 30 (UPI) -- A British psychologist says shopping "therapy" could be a way for premenstrual women to deal with the negative emotions created by hormonal changes.

Study leader Karen Pine of the University of Hertfordshire asked 443 women ages 18-50 about their spending habits.

Pine found that almost two-thirds of the 153 women studied who were in the later stages of their menstrual cycle admitted they had bought something on an impulse, while more than half said they had overspent by more than $35 -- and a handful of the women said they had overspent by more than $350 -- the BBC reported.

Pine speculated that the spending could be explained by hormonal changes during the menstrual cycle -- or the women might be buying items to make themselves feel more attractive, coinciding with the time of ovulation when they are most fertile, typically around 14 days before the start of a period.

"We are getting surges and fluctuations in hormones which affect the part of the brain linked to emotions and inhibitory control," Pine says in a statement. "They are feeling stressed or depressed and are more likely to go shopping to cheer themselves up and using it to regulate their emotions."

Pine, author of the book "Sheconomics," suggests that if women were worried about their spending habits they might avoid shopping in the week before their period was due.