Both Gender and Agonistic Experience Affect Perceived Pain during the Cold Pressor Test

Pierluigi Diotaiuti, Stefano Corrado, Stefania Mancone, Marco Palombo, Angelo Rodio, Lavinia Falese, Elisa Langiano, Thaìs Cristina Siqueira and Alexandro Andrade
Additional contact information
Pierluigi Diotaiuti: Department of Human Sciences, Society and Health, University of Cassino and Southern Lazio, 03043 Cassino, Italy
Stefano Corrado: Department of Human Sciences, Society and Health, University of Cassino and Southern Lazio, 03043 Cassino, Italy
Stefania Mancone: Department of Human Sciences, Society and Health, University of Cassino and Southern Lazio, 03043 Cassino, Italy
Marco Palombo: Department of Human Sciences, Society and Health, University of Cassino and Southern Lazio, 03043 Cassino, Italy
Angelo Rodio: Department of Human Sciences, Society and Health, University of Cassino and Southern Lazio, 03043 Cassino, Italy
Lavinia Falese: Department of Human Sciences, Society and Health, University of Cassino and Southern Lazio, 03043 Cassino, Italy
Elisa Langiano: Department of Human Sciences, Society and Health, University of Cassino and Southern Lazio, 03043 Cassino, Italy
Thaìs Cristina Siqueira: Health and Sports Science Center, Department of Physical Education, CEFID, Santa Catarina State University, Florianópolis 88035-901, Brazil
Alexandro Andrade: Health and Sports Science Center, Department of Physical Education, CEFID, Santa Catarina State University, Florianópolis 88035-901, Brazil

IJERPH, 2022, vol. 19, issue 4, 1-11

Abstract: Background. Differences in pain perception in athletes have recently been highlighted in the literature. Objectives. To compare gender ratings of perceived pain in athletes with low and high agonistic experiences (N = 200) using the Cold Pressor Test (CPT). Methods. A three-way repeated measures ANOVA to assess both the effects of the athletes’ gender and lower vs. higher agonistic experiences in the intensity of perceived pain at the beginning of the cold box hand immersion (L 0 ) and after a 90 s interval (L 1 ). Results. There was a statistically significant interaction effect between the level of the agonistic experience and gender in the two moments: p < 0.001; η p 2 = 0.266; F(1,49) = 9.771. Simple main effects analysis showed a significative difference for females at L 0 : F(1,99) = 93.567, p < 0.025, partial η 2 = 0.302) and for males at L 1 : F(1,99) = 173.420, p < 0.025, partial η 2 = 0.666. At the initial moment of CPT, the female athletes showed significantly higher perceived intensity than males, regardless of their experience level. After a 90 s interval, a significantly lower pain perception effect associated with the increased competitive experience of male athletes was observed. Female athletes did not appear to benefit from the experience effect on their pain tolerance. Conclusions. The study confirmed a significant difference in pain perception associated with the athletes’ gender and agonistic experience. Separate explanations related to the pattern of pain inhibition and the acquired reduction in pain sensitivity are reported.

Keywords: athletes; gender; agonistic experience; pain tolerance; cold pressor test; temporal summation of pain (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/4/2336/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/4/2336/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:4:p:2336-:d:752293

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().