Religious Influence on Menstrual Attitudes and Symptoms

Menstrual attitudes and symptoms of 18 Orthodox Jewish Mikvah attenders, 23 Orthodox Jewish Mikvah non-attenders, 35 Protestant women, and 45 Catholic women were compared. When age, education, number of pregnancies, and religiosity were controlled, Mikvah non-attenders and Protestants most strongly endorsed a view of menstruation as a bothersome event. No significant differences were found, however, in expected or retrospectively reported menstrual symptoms. Correlational analyses indicated that attitudes, expectancies, and symptoms were significantly correlated only for the Catholic women. Differences between groups in religiosity and socialization were found. The Jewish women endorsed doctrines such as "menstruation makes women unclean" more than Catholic or Protestant women. Results support the hypothesized differential religious training regarding menstruation, but only offer weak support for the effects of this training on menstrual attitudes, expectancies, and symptoms.