Dr. Houle's Research Projects
Through the application of a biopsychosocial process model, we are studying the various influences on the “shocks” (at) to a system that can cause increased headache frequency or intensity. Predictors such as hormonal influences, stress, sleep, weather, and physiological arousal are being monitored to examine their temporal relationships with headache activity within an individual headache sufferer.
In a recent study we examined the relationship between the diagnosis of migraine and self-reported sexual desire. Members of the community or students (N = 68) were administered the Brief Headache Diagnostic Interview and the Sexual Desire Inventory (SDI). Interestingly, migraine participants reported higher SDI scores, and rated their own perceived level of sexual desire higher than tension headache sufferers. The metabolism of 5-HT has been shown to covary with the onset of a migraine attack, and migraine sufferers appear to have chronically low systemic 5-HT. As sexual desire also has been linked to serotonin levels, the results are consistent with the hypothesis that migraine and sexual desire both may be modulated by similar serotonergic phenomena.
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