# Birth control weakens your Si?



## Elaminopy (Jun 29, 2011)

I was reading Cracked.com and came across this article.



> ...scientists have just discovered that the birth control pill has strange effects on a woman's memory. To explore this, they showed a group of women (half on the pill and half not) a film and asked them a bunch of questions about it afterward. What they found was that the women who weren't taking the pill generally had a pretty good eye for details. The others, however, tended to fumble along like toddlers in a pool made of Jell-O.
> 
> The results backed up something that the researchers suspected about how the pill messes with the female body. It comes down to the differences in the way men and women remember. Women typically retain smaller details, while men recall the bigger picture -- men see the forest, while women see the legs on the aphids on the leaves on the trees.
> 
> But birth control pills alter a woman's hormones, specifically by lowering the ones associated with reproduction. It makes her brain more dude-like. So, she starts to remember just the big picture, like a dude. Remember, everything in the brain is connected -- change one chemical, and the effects ripple out into other areas.


I found this interesting, especially considering the part about females being more Si than males.


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## Tad Cooper (Apr 10, 2010)

It's interesting, but the writer using the term 'dude' doesn't make it sound very academic ><


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## Elaminopy (Jun 29, 2011)

Well, it is a comedy website at heart. They just make sure they use real studies to back it up.


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## Spades (Aug 31, 2011)

"Dude", what does this pool of jello have to do with Cognitive Functions again?


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## Sequestrum (Sep 11, 2011)

If the pill is just changing the focus of what someone remembers, is it really weakening Si? or is it just changing the focus on the lens?


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## Elaminopy (Jun 29, 2011)

Sequestrum said:


> If the pill is just changing the focus of what someone remembers, is it really weakening Si? or is it just changing the focus on the lens?


But in the event of just the latter, it would be using it less and thus causing it to weaken.


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## Stephen (Jan 17, 2011)

But Si isn't related to detailed memory. It's about contextual perception, very much the opposite of detail in my eyes. If there's a function that is closely connected to detail, it's going to be an extraverted or objective function like Se or Ne.


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## Spades (Aug 31, 2011)

Elaminopy said:


> But in the event of just the latter, it would be using it less and thus causing it to weaken.


Why did you jump to the conclusion that this study was describing Si? Si is more than just looking at pictures and remembering their details. It's the entire structure behind ones' information gathering. Does this mean we can convert Sensors to iNtuitives? No. And now I'm definitely not taking birth control, I like the amount of attention to detail I have. That is, if this study really exists.


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## 2GiveMyHeart2 (Jan 2, 2012)

What brand of birth control pills did they use? Does it say? There are all sorts of types and I would think one would be different (in side effects) from the other.


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## Sequestrum (Sep 11, 2011)

From the Article Comments:


> hamsterjelly
> 01/17/12 06:07 PM
> Oh god, the birth control thing explains so much! No wonder I'm so terrible at taking tests. My nursing midterm is going to suck.
> But thanks for the explanation!
> ...


It is possible that the data they collected doesn't necessarily support their thesis as well. There could be another explanation for why their test yielded the results it did, but I don't know what that would be.


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## Donovan (Nov 3, 2009)

Stephen said:


> But Si isn't related to detailed memory. It's about contextual perception, very much the opposite of detail in my eyes. If there's a function that is closely connected to detail, it's going to be an extraverted or objective function like Se or Ne.


what do you mean by "contextual perception"?


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## Elaminopy (Jun 29, 2011)

Spades said:


> Why did you jump to the conclusion that this study was describing Si? Si is more than just looking at pictures and remembering their details. It's the entire structure behind ones' information gathering. Does this mean we can convert Sensors to iNtuitives? No. And now I'm definitely not taking birth control, I like the amount of attention to detail I have. That is, if this study really exists.


Hmm, then perhaps my idea of Si is incorrect. I thought Si was storing and recalling details and information from the past, or memory, while Se was noticing details in the outside world for as long as you are experiencing it. Several people on here have pointed out the fact that a lot of my posts are very detailed as evidence that my Sensing function is strong.


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## Spades (Aug 31, 2011)

Elaminopy said:


> Hmm, then perhaps my idea of Si is incorrect. I thought Si was storing and recalling details and information from the past, or memory, while Se was noticing details in the outside world for as long as you are experiencing it. Several people on here have pointed out the fact that a lot of my posts are very detailed as evidence that my Sensing function is strong.


If that were true, Ni users would have no memory and nothing to base any of their future projections on, and Ne users would be completely oblivious to anything happening around them. It's clearly not the case. I have an excellent long-term memory, and I don't attribute this to any function. It's not *how much* we remember, it's *how* we remember. More importantly, how we use that to guide our decision-making, and *what we place priority on*. If you are not sure whether you use Sensation or Intuition more, I would definitely not base it off what you remember from pictures =P It's not trivial to determine, and I know I'm not being very helpful either, heh.


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## Stephen (Jan 17, 2011)

celticstained said:


> what do you mean by "contextual perception"?


I just mean that we perceive things primarily based on their symbolic context, rather than as they really are.


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## Elaminopy (Jun 29, 2011)

Spades said:


> If that were true, Ni users would have no memory and nothing to base any of their future projections on, and Ne users would be completely oblivious to anything happening around them. It's clearly not the case. I have an excellent long-term memory, and I don't attribute this to any function. It's not *how much* we remember, it's *how* we remember. More importantly, how we use that to guide our decision-making, and *what we place priority on*. If you are not sure whether you use Sensation or Intuition more, I would definitely not base it off what you remember from pictures =P It's not trivial to determine, and I know I'm not being very helpful either, heh.


Right, it's how you remember. One person would look at a photo and remember some details, the mood of it seemed sad, and that one guy looked like he was going to punch the other. Someone else might remember the angles the cars were parked and that they seemed crooked, and also the colors of the cars. I always thought of Si as noticing and remembering the details of things, but not other things like mood, which is what the article seems to be talking about. And everyone has all the functions. Ni user have Si, they just use it for different reasons in different circumstances. Even more so, Ne users use Si because using Ne means you use Si.


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## Elaminopy (Jun 29, 2011)

Stephen said:


> I just mean that we perceive things primarily based on their symbolic context, rather than as they really are.


I thought that was iNtuition, whereas Sensing was how they really are. The orientation just explains where the source is, from your memories or the outside world. Is that wrong?


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## Stephen (Jan 17, 2011)

Elaminopy said:


> I thought that was iNtuition, whereas Sensing was how they really are. The orientation just explains where the source is, from your memories or the outside world. Is that wrong?


Extraverted perceiving functions address the object, or the world around us, while introverted ones are directed inward at the subject. Se is objective and concrete (what really is), while Ne is objective and abstract (what may be but is not apparent). Neither Si nor Ni directly perceive the object by default, and instead address the symbolic context.


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## Zero11 (Feb 7, 2010)

tine said:


> It's interesting, but the writer using the term 'dude' doesn't make it sound very academic ><


It doesn´t seems academic = so it is wrong :laughing:

dude-like is easier to read and so to understand :tongue:


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## Nymma (Apr 24, 2010)

> Women typically retain smaller details, while men recall the bigger picture -- men see the forest, while women see the legs on the aphids on the leaves on the trees.


........................................


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## Stephen (Jan 17, 2011)

Elaminopy said:


> And everyone has all the functions. Ni user have Si, they just use it for different reasons in different circumstances. Even more so, Ne users use Si because using Ne means you use Si.


It depends which of the many (sometimes conflicting) variations on the theory that you accept. I stick to four functions, not eight, and describe them as Jung did.


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## Spades (Aug 31, 2011)

Inferior Fi rant removed.


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## Angelic Gardevoir (Oct 7, 2010)

*reads title of thread* Wha...?

(I did read the OP, but I have nothing else to say.)


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## electricky (Feb 18, 2011)

Spades said:


> If that were true, Ni users would have no memory and nothing to base any of their future projections on, and Ne users would be completely oblivious to anything happening around them. It's clearly not the case. I have an excellent long-term memory, and I don't attribute this to any function. It's not *how much* we remember, it's *how* we remember. More importantly, how we use that to guide our decision-making, and *what we place priority on*. If you are not sure whether you use Sensation or Intuition more, I would definitely not base it off what you remember from pictures =P It's not trivial to determine, and I know I'm not being very helpful either, heh.


Agreed, though I have to wonder if the perception functions relate to _how_ we remember, if that might have any effect upon _what_ we remember, and yeah not some temporary deficit from birth control but more of a distinct pattern throughout our lives.



Stephen said:


> If there's a function that is closely connected to detail, it's going to be an extraverted or objective function like Se or Ne.


Well, looks like all the functions won't contribute to remembering details then :laughing: All in a blur of some sort or another...



Article said:


> It comes down to the differences in the way men and women remember. Women typically retain smaller details, while men recall the bigger picture -- men see the forest, while women see the legs on the aphids on the leaves on the trees.


I'd really like to see the research that backs this one up.


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## Tad Cooper (Apr 10, 2010)

Zero11 said:


> It doesn´t seems academic = so it is wrong :laughing:
> 
> dude-like is easier to read and so to understand :tongue:


 Haha I didn;'t mean wrong ^^; I meant it broke up the text and didn't flow.


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## Figure (Jun 22, 2011)

How could birth control possible "weaken" something that's a mere category?


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## Tulipgarden (Apr 5, 2012)

I know birth control pills make me feel a little psycho. I refuse! They alter a lot of things.
Evil pills. I don't know anything about the category part. What category is psycho crazy bitch under?


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## Elaminopy (Jun 29, 2011)

ElectricSparkle said:


> I'd really like to see the research that backs this one up.


Here's where it came from: Birth control pills affect memory, study finds

"What's most exciting about this study is that it shows the use of hormonal contraception alters memory," UCI graduate researcher Shawn Nielsen said. "There are only a handful of studies examining the cognitive effects of the pill, and more than 100 million women use it worldwide."

She stressed that the medications did not damage memory. "It's a change in the type of information they remember, not a deficit."

The change makes sense, said Nielsen, who works with neurobiologist Larry Cahill, because contraceptives suppress sex hormones such as estrogen and progesterone to prevent pregnancy. Those hormones were previously linked to women's strong "left brain" memory by Cahill's research group.

"This new finding may be surprising to some, but it's a natural outgrowth of the research we've been doing on sex differences for 10 years," Cahill said. A neurobiologist not involved in the latest work agreed it was a logical and intriguing next step in the examination of memory differences between the sexes. Like any research, she added, it would be important to validate it further.

"Larry Cahill is already well known for his phenomenal research linking sex to memory," said Pauline Maki, professor of psychiatry and psychology at the University of Illinois at Chicago, who specializes in memory and brain functioning. "The fact that women on oral contraceptives remembered different elements of a story tells us that estrogen has an influence on how women remember emotional events."

In the study, groups of women either on the contraceptive or experiencing natural hormonal cycles were shown photographs of a mother, her son, and a car accident. The audio narrative differed; some in each group were told the car had hit a curb, while others were told the car had hit the boy and critically injured him.

One week later, all were given surprise tests about what they recalled. Women using hormonal contraceptives for as little as one month remembered more clearly the main steps in the traumatic event – that there had been an accident, that the boy had been rushed to the hospital, that doctors worked to save his life and successfully reattached both his feet, for instance.

Women not using them remembered more details, such as a fire hydrant next to the car.

Nielsen and fellow researcher Nicole Ertman agreed the findings could help lead to fuller answers about why women experience post traumatic stress syndrome more frequently than men, and how men remember differently than women. Men typically rely more on right-hemisphere brain activity to encode memory. They retain the gist of things better than details. Women on the pill, who have lower levels of hormones associated with female reproduction, may remember emotional events similarly to men. Nielsen plans to do her doctoral thesis on whether hormones affect the retention of details.

The work, funded by the National Institute of Mental Health, appears in the September issue of the journal Neurobiology of Learning and Memory. Additional authors include Cahill and UCI undergraduate research assistant Yasmeen Lakhani.

Provided by University of California - Irvine



LXPilot said:


> How could birth control possible "weaken" something that's a mere category?


Only as far as using something less would weaken your skill at using it and strengthen the other ones you use more. Could be completely incorrect, though. My commentary was just going off of my rough knowledge of the functions.


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## Figure (Jun 22, 2011)

> Only as far as using something less would weaken your skill at using it and strengthen the other ones you use more.


Hmmm. That poses an interesting question, and maybe a misinterpretation of the CF's on my part. I always understood them to represent a style of thinking as it stands alone from "proficiency" or "deficiency" of use. If this was the case, the Si preferring person would _use_ Si as frequently as before and in the same way, just with the increased likelihood of making an error. They're still using Si proficiently in the sense of depending on it over other functions. 

Just food for thought.


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## CounterPoint (Oct 13, 2010)

Si and Ne are inversely connected. If Si is lowered, then by default Ne would increase. Ne would speculate, take risks and explore. It would be more believable that BC diminished Si if the study concentrated on behavioral changes (a higher propensity to take risk, etc).

As an example, toxyoplasmosis is a parasite generally found in kitty litter. There has been correlations between the parasite and risky behavior and reduced attention span among other things.


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## slyspy (May 18, 2011)

Elaminopy said:


> The change makes sense, said Nielsen, who works with neurobiologist Larry Cahill, because contraceptives suppress sex hormones such as estrogen and progesterone to prevent pregnancy.


The *combined oral contraceptive pill* (*COCP*), often referred to as the *birth-control pill* or colloquially as "*the Pill*", is a birth control method that includes a combination of an estrogen (oestrogen) and a progestin (progestogen). -Wikipedia

The pill uses estrogen and progestogen to inhibit female fertility. It doesn't suppress these hormones. They are enhanced. Usually during the most fertile period of a woman's menstrual cycle they have higher levels of testosterone (a more 'male' brain). The pills therefore SHOULD make them see MORE detail not less if estrogen and progestogen do enhance a woman's 'left brain'.


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## Elaminopy (Jun 29, 2011)

slyspy said:


> The *combined oral contraceptive pill* (*COCP*), often referred to as the *birth-control pill* or colloquially as "*the Pill*", is a birth control method that includes a combination of an estrogen (oestrogen) and a progestin (progestogen). -Wikipedia
> 
> The pill uses estrogen and progestogen to inhibit female fertility. It doesn't suppress these hormones. They are enhanced. Usually during the most fertile period of a woman's menstrual cycle they have higher levels of testosterone (a more 'male' brain). The pills therefore SHOULD make them see MORE detail not less if estrogen and progestogen do enhance a woman's 'left brain'.


_Studies have shown that hormonal contraception suppresses levels of endogenous estrogen and progesterone. The synthetic estrogen and progestins in hormonal contraception inhibit gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) via negative feedback, preventing both the mid-cycle surge of luteinizing hormone (LH) and subsequently, ovulation (Rapkin, Morgan, Sogliano, Biggio, & Concas, 2006). Inhibition of GnRH in turn suppresses endogenous levels of estrogen and progesterone, likely disrupting sex/stress hormone interactions, cognitive performance, and memory._

Taken from this: http://cahill.bio.uci.edu/Nielsenetal2011.pdf


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## slyspy (May 18, 2011)

Elaminopy said:


> _Studies have shown that hormonal contraception suppresses levels of endogenous estrogen and progesterone. The synthetic estrogen and progestins in hormonal contraception inhibit gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) via negative feedback, preventing both the mid-cycle surge of luteinizing hormone (LH) and subsequently, ovulation (Rapkin, Morgan, Sogliano, Biggio, & Concas, 2006). Inhibition of GnRH in turn suppresses endogenous levels of estrogen and progesterone, likely disrupting sex/stress hormone interactions, cognitive performance, and memory._
> 
> Taken from this: http://cahill.bio.uci.edu/Nielsenetal2011.pdf


So a pill made of estrogen and progesterone suppresses estrogen and progesterone levels? Or is it a different kind of contraception they are talking about?


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## Tulipgarden (Apr 5, 2012)

slyspy said:


> So a pill made of estrogen and progesterone suppresses estrogen and progesterone levels? Or is it a different kind of contraception they are talking about?



It more or less controls the amount of estrogen and progesterone. Estrogen rises as ovulation occurs and progesterone rises after ovulation, during the luteal phase. Progesterone is what sustains a pregnancy in the first trimester until
The placenta takes over. Anyway, if the person doesn't get pregnant the progesterone levels drop and it brings on the period and a whole new cycle. The pill introduces a high enough level to convince the body or fake the body into being pregnant surpressing ovulation. The estrogen level must be low enough in the pill to bring about menses but not allow Ovulation. 

Or another way to look at it that we won't produce a high level of progesterone UNLESS we ovulate so in a way it is suppressed but introduced synthetically to stave off ovulation. 

We are complicated and I deduce that because men don't have to deal with the ups and down of hormonal shifts that they find it easier to focus. Although, personal experience tells me that once progesterone drops off I have more energy, am more sexually aware, and clear minded and even tempered. In otherwords Progesterone is evil.


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## firedell (Aug 5, 2009)




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