Physical and Psychological Symptom Burden Across Age Groups: A Biopsychosocial Analysis of Hormone-Related Health Experiences

Abstract

Background: Hormonal and hormone-related health experiences often involve physical symptoms, emotional changes, sleep disturbance, cognitive complaints, and concerns about everyday functioning. Yet physical and psychological manifestations are frequently examined separately, and observational symptom data are sometimes interpreted more causally than the measurements permit. This study examined the association between self-reported physical and psychological symptom burden and compared psychological symptoms across age groups, diagnosis status, and gender.

Methods: A quantitative, cross-sectional, correlational and comparative framework was applied to a supplied 400-case analytical dataset containing 100 cases in each of four age groups: adolescents aged 13–19 years, young adults aged 20–39 years, middle-aged adults aged 40–60 years, and seniors aged 61 years and above. The questionnaire included six psychological symptom items, six physical symptom items, four biopsychosocial interconnection items, a 1–10 physical-health effect on mood rating, demographic variables, and self-reported hormonal or hormone-related diagnosis status. Internal consistency, correlations, analysis of variance, independent-samples comparisons, non-parametric robustness tests, effect sizes, and multivariable regression were examined.

Results: The Psychological and Physical Symptom Scales showed good internal consistency (α = .809 and .828). Physical symptom burden was positively associated with psychological symptom burden (r = .318, 95% CI [.227, .403], p < .001; Spearman ρ = .328, p < .001). Psychological symptoms differed across age groups, F(3, 396) = 11.98, p < .001, η² = .083, with middle-aged adults reporting the highest mean score. Participants reporting a confirmed hormonal or hormone-related diagnosis had higher psychological symptom scores than those without a confirmed diagnosis (Hedges’ g = .45, p < .001). Female and male participants did not differ significantly (p = .609, g = −.05). In adjusted analysis, physical symptom burden, confirmed diagnosis, and middle-aged group membership remained associated with psychological symptoms.

Conclusions: The pattern supports a biopsychosocial interpretation in which physical and psychological symptom burdens are interconnected, while age and diagnosis status provide additional context. Because hormone concentrations were not measured and the design is cross-sectional, the findings do not establish endocrine causation. In addition, the project documentation identifies the supplied analytical dataset as synthetic/simulated; therefore, the numerical findings should be treated as methodology-validation results unless provenance is independently verified before empirical publication.