Legal and illegal abortion: Coping with the impact of social policies on women's lives.

Little is known about women's experiences of illegal abortion. Nor is it clear if literature on women's psychological responses to legal abortion is applicable to circumstances of illegal abortion. Long-term and political outcomes of women's abortion experiences also have escaped investigation. This study compared the experiences of 36 women who had illegal abortions between 1963 to 1972 with those of 37 women who had legal abortions between 1970 to 1978. All participants completed a lengthy questionnaire about their experiences. Seven women also participated in in-depth interviews. The women in this sample who had illegal abortions more often attempted to self-induce abortions. They suffered higher rates of medical and psychiatric complications. Having had a type of abortion procedure in which labor was induced, as opposed to having a D&C or vacuum aspiration procedure, was associated with higher rates of medical and psychiatric complications. In addition, content analyses revealed more imagery suggestive of trauma or exploitation in the narrative accounts of women who had illegal abortions. For women in both groups, positive emotions increased following their abortions. However, women who had illegal abortions experienced more intense and longer lasting levels of certain negative emotions. The only emotion which differed between the two groups in the present was higher anger for women who had illegal abortions. Guilt and shame did not differ between the two groups. As suggested by the literature on women' s responses to legal abortion, age, social support, and decisional conflict were all important predictors of outcome for both groups. However, it appeared that women in this sample who had illegal abortions self-selected for certain qualities--being older, having unusual support networks among friends, and being less socially-conforming, which may have enhanced their coping with the greater stresses they encountered. The majority of the women in this sample felt that having had an abortion opened significant life opportunities for them. While there were no differences between the women in the two groups on measures of political identity and activism, most of the women in the sample felt they had been politicized by their experience of abortion.PhDPsychologyPublic policySocial SciencesSocial psychologyWomen's studiesUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/128686/2/9124012.pd