There is a common belief that women tolerate pain more easily than men. In fact, some studies have shown that for this reason, emergency physicians take women's pain complaints less seriously. This is not entirely unfounded, since at the cellular level, it appears that men and women process painful stimuli differently. However, pain is too complex a process controlled by the nervous system, so it is impossible to say definitively who tolerates pain more easily and who has a lower pain threshold. However, there is some research on this matter.
There is an opinion that women do not feel pain as much as men. Photo source: dariknews.bg
How and why do people feel pain
Pain occurs when certain sensory neurons known as “nociceptors” detect painful stimuli and send signals about them to the brain. The brain then processes these signals and converts them into sensations that we call pain.
In order for nociceptors to be activated, that is, pain occurs, stimuli must exceed certain thresholds. For example, exposure of the skin to a temperature of 40 degrees does not cause pain, since in this case the pain threshold is not exceeded. A temperature of 50 degrees can already cause pain, since in this case the pain threshold is exceeded.
For pain to occur, painful stimuli must pass a certain threshold. Photo source: yamoscow.ru
Painful stimuli are of several types, for example, in addition to high temperature, they include mechanical pressure, inflammation, etc. The pain caused by each stimulus is felt differently. But the most interesting thing is that different people do not even feel the same stimulus in the same way. The differences are due to many factors, one of which is gender.
Why do men and women feel pain differently
There is no exact answer to this question yet, but scientists have discovered that nociceptors in men and women are activated by different substances. Simply put, the first stage of the pain mechanism differs between men and women. Studies have shown that the hormone prolactin is involved in the response to pain in women, and in men the hormone orexin performs the same function.
It is also known that in men and women, the pain threshold can decrease in certain situations. For example, water heated to 40 degrees, as mentioned above, does not cause pain. But if a person has an ulcer in his mouth, he may experience pain. In a recent study, scientists decided to find out whether the way the pain threshold decreases depends on gender.
In men and women, pain occurs with the participation of different hormones. Photo source: www.medicalnewstoday.com
For their work, the scientists took samples of nociceptor cells from male and female mice, as well as non-human primates and humans. All cells were exposed to different substances – orexin and prolactin. The experiment showed that all cells responded differently to both substances. Prolactin lowered the threshold for activation of female nociceptors, but had no effect on male cells. Orexin, on the contrary, lowered the activation threshold of male cells, but had no effect on female cells.
Who can bear pain more easily — men or women
Quite a lot of studies have shown that women have a higher sensitivity to pain and at the same time a lower pain threshold than men. For example, in 2012, scientists conducted an experiment to find out how men and women react to physical pressure. The results showed that women tolerate mechanical pain worse.
In another study, researchers looked at how men and women responded to a heat stimulus. As it turned out, women have a lower pain threshold to cold and heat, that is, women begin to feel pain when men do not yet feel it. However, some studies show the opposite results.
Some studies have shown that women are more susceptible to pain from low and high temperatures: Photo source: tsn24.ru
In 2023, researchers conducted an experiment in which they involved 22 teenagers – 10 boys and 12 girls. Volunteers were exposed to thermal stimuli – first they experienced cold and then high temperature. In both cases, boys rated the pain as more severe than girls.
Thus, studies sometimes show two opposing results. But there is also a third result – some studies suggest that men and women perceive pain equally, at least caused by high temperature.
The perception of pain depends more on the individual characteristics of the body than on gender. Photo source: dzen.ru
Such disagreements are associated with various reasons. First of all, there are no ways to accurately measure a person's pain tolerance. In addition, as mentioned above, the pain threshold and pain tolerance depend on various factors and can vary in the same person. In general, the situation is approximately the same as with the perception of cold – men and women freeze approximately equally at the same temperature.
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By the way, earlier we told you what types of pain in the human body are considered the most severe. All of them are unbearable for both men and women. Considering all of the above, we can conclude that if there are differences between the perception of pain in men and women, they are insignificant, despite the fact that sensory neurons do work somewhat differently.