Prenatal exposure to virilizing progestins: An adult follow-up study of twelve women

Psychological data were collected on 12 young women, aged 16 to 27 years, with a history of prenatal progestin exposure. In 11 cases, this exposure had induced virilization of the external genitalia. The 12th woman was an anatomically unaffected sister of one of the other women. The sample was composed of 10 women reported on as children by Ehrhardt and Money (1967), Money and Ehrhardt, (1972) as well as two others who were added to this group because they conformed to the original selection criteria for the Money and Ehrhardt studies. Of the 12 women, 10 had completed high school; of these, 7 were in college, 2 were in graduate school, and 1 was raising a family full-time. None of the 12 had a history of difficulty in establishing friendships or dating relationships. Despite childhood characterizations as "tomboys" and avid interest in high school sports, none of the women pursued sports as a career or major pastime. Because of difficulties in personally contacting all 12 women, data on erotic behavior are available for only 6. Only one of these 6, the youngest, reported no erotic experience, and the remaining 5 reported exclusively heterosexual erotic experience and imagery.