Between- and within-sex variation in hormonal responses to psychological stress in a large sample of college students

Figures & data

Figure 1  (a) Correlation between pre-test and post-test salivary testosterone concentrations in males and females (r = 0.57; n = 501; p < 0.0001). (b) Correlation between pre-test and post-test salivary cortisol concentrations in males and females (r = 0.42; n = 501; p < 0.0001).

Figure 2  (a) Correlation between pre-test salivary testosterone and cortisol concentrations in males and females (r = 0.29, n = 501, p < 0.0001). (b) Correlation between post-test salivary testosterone and cortisol concentrations in males and females (r = 0.30, n = 501, p < 0.0001).

Figure 3  (a) Pre- and post-test salivary testosterone concentrations (mean ± SEM) in males and females in early and late tests. Times of test are indicated on the x-axis. Males had significantly higher testosterone level than females in both the pre-test and the post-test conditions (both p < 0.0001). Testosterone concentration was significantly higher in late than in early samples, irrespective of gender, but only in the post-test condition (p = 0.001). (b) Pre- and post-test salivary cortisol concentrations (mean ± SEM) in males and females in early and late tests. Males had significantly higher cortisol concentration than females in both the pre-test (p < 0.0001) and the post-test conditions (p = 0.03). Cortisol concentration was significantly higher in early than in late samples, irrespective of gender, but only in the post-test condition (p = 0.002). See Results text for detailed statistical results. Sample sizes are: males, early test, n = 201; late test, n = 147; females, early test, n = 101, late test, n = 52. Sample sizes are the same for pre- and post-test data, and for testosterone and cortisol data.

Figure 4  (a) Correlation between salivary pre-test testosterone concentrations and the difference between post-test and pre-test testosterone concentrations (r = 0.55; n = 501; p < 0.0001). (b) Correlation between pre-test salivary cortisol concentrations and the difference between post-test and pre-test cortisol concentrations (r = 0.56; n = 501; p < 0.0001). Data are for all subjects.

Table I.  Mean ± SEM testosterone (T, pg/ml) and cortisol (cort, ng/ml) concentrations and their residuals in male and female study participants with respect to relationship and marital status.

	Average T	T residuals	Average cort	Cort residuals
Unpaired males (n = 186)	103.9 ± 2.43*	7.46 ± 3.0	8.52 ± 0.25	0.75 ± 0.31*
Unpaired females (n = 68)	46.30 ± 2.51	− 15.21 ± 1.42	7.59 ± 0.43	0.33 ± 0.04
Paired males (n = 132)	96.47 ± 2.56*	5.10 ± 0.23	8.47 ± 0.32	− 0.79 ± 0.31*
Paired females (n = 77)	50.10 ± 2.74	− 15.31 ± 1.02	6.84 ± 0.37	− 0.31 ± 0.05
Unmarried males (n = 29)	94.07 ± 6.63	9.03 ± 5.87	8.64 ± 0.79	− 0.41 ± 0.73
Unmarried females (n = 40)	52.20 ± 4.47	− 15.15 ± 4.37	7.21 ± 0.47	0.32 ± 0.46
Males without children (n = 84)	96.72 ± 3.19	3.09 ± 3.02	8.55 ± 0.39	− 0.71 ± 0.38
Females without children (n = 32)	49.43 ± 3.33	− 15.53 ± 5.24	6.66 ± 0.61	− 0.88 ± 0.46
Males with children (n = 19)	99.01 ± 4.18	7.97 ± 6.28	7.87 ± 0.64	− 1.73 ± 0.84
Females with children (n = 5)	37.62 ± 5.74	− 15.19 ± 7.55	5.07 ± 1.38	− 1.59 ± 0.77

*p < 0.05, Student's t test for unpaired samples.

Figure 5  Residuals for salivary cortisol concentrations in unpaired individuals (n = 254), paired but unmarried individuals (n = 69), and married individuals with (n = 166) and without children (n = 24). Data for both males and females are presented. See text for statistical results. Values are mean ± SEM. The difference among the four groups is statistically significant (p = 0.001); see Results text for detailed statistical results. Unpaired individuals had significantly higher cortisol residuals than both married individuals without children (Bonferroni–Dunn post hoc test, p < 0.05) and married individuals with children (Bonferroni–Dunn post hoc test, p < 0.05).