TORONTO, Sept. 4 (UPI) -- Canadian researchers say a new study indicates morning sickness may be as much a psychological condition as a physical one.
University of Toronto researchers Kiran Chandra and Laura Magee concluded women's actual symptoms and how they perceive them are very different. They estimated only about 14 percent of women's illnesses could be attributed to physical symptoms.
Chandra and Magee said women tend to perceive symptom severity according to how they are feeling overall and how other aspects of their lives are affected.
But Belinda Phipps of Canada's National Childbirth Trust questioned the findings, telling BBC News Online: "To the women who have it, morning sickness is very real. I am surprised the research team thinks so much of morning sickness is in the mind."
She said the research findings are not helpful: "It undermines a woman's confidence in listening to what her body's telling her is right. What's really important is for a woman to listen to her body and do what it says.
"The idea that morning sickness is a psychological problem is in the minds of the researchers, rather than in the minds of women."
