Thèse Modulation Neuroendocrine de la Consommation d'Alcool et du Craving au Cours du Cycle Menstruel H/F - Doctorat.Gouv.Fr

Établissement : Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 École doctorale : NSCo - Neurosciences et Cognition Laboratoire de recherche : CRNL - CENTRE DE RECHERCHE EN NEUROSCIENCES DE LYON Direction de la thèse : Benjamin ROLLAND ORCID 0000000286663635 Début de la thèse : 2026-10-01 Date limite de candidature : 2026-11-03T23:59:59 Voir anglais dessous In France, the 2021 Public Health Barometer revealed a worrying shift in alcohol consumption among women, with the monthly prevalence of binge drinking rising from 7.6% to 8.6% (Andler et al., 2024). This trend carries significant public health implications, imposing increasing risk of cancers, cardiovascular and digestive diseases as well as accidents and suicides (Andler et al., 2024). Although daily alcohol consumption remains less common among women (3.8%) than men (12.6%), women show greater vulnerability to developing alcohol use disorder (AUD) (Andler et al., 2024). Beyond the many cultural factors that contribute to this vulnerability, both human and animal studies point to the crucial role of ovarian hormones (Towers et al., 2022). Progesterone appears to exert a protective effect against alcohol consumption, with an inverse correlation reported between progesterone levels and alcohol craving in previous studies (Weinland et al., 2021). Accordingly, the frequency of binge drinking episodes varies across the menstrual cycle, with higher risk during the ovulatory phase, when estradiol levels peak (Hoffmann et al., 2024). Furthermore, anxiety is a frequent driver of consumption in women and is itself shaped by the menstrual cycle and the progesterone-to-estradiol ratio (Hoffmann et al., 2024; Towers et al., 2022). Yet no study has examined whether anxiety associated with consumption peaks in women may correlate to underlying hormonal variations. Furthermore, ovarian hormones carry significant functional impact on brain systems (Barth et al., 2015), however the implications for substance use in females remain underexplored. Recently, Koban et al. (2023) used machine-learning and fMRI to develop a Neurobiological Craving Signature (NCS), which predicts the intensity of cue-evoked craving with high accuracy (>80% out-of-sample). Yet, how self-reported alcohol craving and craving-related brain activity changes over the menstrual cycle remains elusive. To address these open questions, the proposed doctoral project is organised around three workpackages. The first study, SALAMANDER, is a prospective, longitudinal clinical study in which each participant is followed for 4 months across three centres across the Lyon region (Centre Hospitalier Le Vinatier, Hôpital du Jour AddiPsy and Hôpital de la Croix-Rousse), over a total investigation period of 20 months. This clinical study is designed to examine the relationship between menstrual cycle phases, levels of stress, anxiety and quality of life in a clinical population with women with AUD. The second study, FLOW, is a longitudinal survey study in the general population, following women with regular menstrual cycles over 3 months each. Once a month, participants report their levels of alcohol consumption via the Alcohol Timeline Follow-Back, complemented by clinical questionnaires capturing perceived stress and anxiety, enabling assessment of how cycle phase relate to consumptions and emotional state. Additional daily visual analogue scales will enable ecological momentary assessment (EMA), capturing alcohol, besides self-assessments of craving, stress, anxiety, and quality of life. Lastly, this doctoral project will include an exploratory investigation of functional brain activity and NCS over the menstrual cycle in, enabling unprecedented insights in the interplay of brain function, menstrual cycle, craving and alcohol consumption. Together, these workpackages aim to shed light on the neuroendocrinological underpinnings of female vulnerability in alcohol consumption. This PhD project pertains to the assessment of the influence of ovarian hormones on the occurrence of binge drinking and alcohol consumption in females (healthy subjects and in individuals with Alcohol Use Disorder). As a secondary objective, the project will also allow the investigation of the relationship between alcohol consumption as well as stress, anxiety and quality of life. Furthermore, this project will include the unprecedented investigation of responses of an a priori brain marker of craving, the Neurobiological Craving Signature (Koban, et al. 2023), over the course of the menstrual cycle, harnessing non-invasive neuroimaging methods. The project offers a multimodal approach, including:
1) Hormonal Measures: to quantify menstrual cycle phases, blood tests will be performed monthly as part of the study SALAMANDER, to measure estrogen and progesterone levels.
2) Clinical Questionnaires: several validated French questionnaires (i.e., Perceived Stress Scale-10 (PSS-10), the Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 (GAD-7), Alcohol Quality of Life Scale (AQoLS)) will be administered, to provide a detailed assessment of stress, anxiety, and quality of life.
3) Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA): participants in the studies SALAMANDER and FLOW will be asked to complete a daily electronic Case Report Form (e-CRF) over the course of each study. This will enable Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA), through which participants will record their alcohol and other substance use, along with daily self-assessments of craving, stress, anxiety, and quality of life using Visual Analogue Scales.
4) Neuroimaging: responses of the Neurobiological Craving Signature will be investigated with non-invasive neuroimaging in combination with a alcohol cue-reactivity task.

Nous recherchons un·e candidat·e titulaire (ou sur le point d'obtenir cette année universitaire) d'un Master en neurosciences, psychologie, sciences cognitives ou un domaine étroitement lié. Le/la candidat·e devra démontrer un solide parcours académique et un intérêt manifeste pour l'investigation des mécanismes neuronaux sous-tendant les comportements liés à la consommation d'alcool.

Formation Académique et Compétences en Recherche
Les candidat·es devront démontrer :
- Des connaissances théoriques solides en neurosciences (cognitives)
- Une formation et de préférence une expérience dans la conduite de recherches empiriques incluant la collecte de données, le prétraitement et l'analyse
- Une maîtrise des logiciels statistiques (ex : R, MATLAB) et des techniques d'analyse de données
- Une expérience en techniques de neuroimagerie et en recherche clinique serait appréciée
Compétences Transversales
- Les candidat·es solides démontrent généralement :
- Un esprit critique et la capacité d'interpréter des données complexes
- Un haut niveau de motivation, des compétences organisationnelles et d'autonomie
- Des compétences de communication efficaces en anglais (écrit et oral)
- Une capacité à travailler en collaboration dans un contexte international

• Statistiques
• Anglais
• Autonomie
• Analyse de données
• MATLAB