Source: Bone

In 1987, medical anthropologist Emily Martin published her groundbreaking book The Woman in the Body: A Cultural Analysis of Reproduction, in which she grounded the female experience of reproduction within the historical sociocultural processes structuring women's embodiment in the USA during the 20th century. Martin focused on capitalism's influence on medicine, arguing that it shaped how the medical profession defined reproduction, and, in turn, how women understood their bodies. She argued that medical texts typically treated female reproduction as production, successful when reaching its “goal” (eg, pregnancy and livebirth) but as “failed” otherwise (eg, menstruation or menopause).

Acetylcholine (ACh) is released from basal forebrain cholinergic neurons in response to salient stimuli and engages brain states supporting attention and memory. These high ACh states are associated w...