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Factors Shaping Women’s Pre-abortion Communication with Members of Their Social Network

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Abstract

To understand women’s pre-abortion conversations with members of their social network about their abortion decision. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with women presenting for first-trimester surgical abortion at a high volume, hospital-based abortion clinic. Women were asked their reasons for discussing or not discussing abortion and responses received after disclosing their abortion decision. Interviews were transcribed and computer-assisted content analysis was performed. Salient themes are presented. Thirty women who obtained an abortion were interviewed. All but three spoke to at least one member of their social network about their abortion decision making. However, women were very selective about whom they spoke to regarding this decision. Reasons not to discuss their abortion decision included: concerns about judgment, desiring to maintain privacy, and certainty about their decision. Reasons to discuss their abortion decision included: seeking information about the procedure, needing guidance about their decision, wanting support for their decision to proceed with abortion. While many were concerned about being judged, most women who spoke about their decision experienced a positive response. Though most women in this study had at least one person to turn to for assistance with abortion decision making, many participants avoided confiding in some or all members of their social network about their abortion decision due to concerns of judgment and stigma.

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Funding

Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Center For Advancing Translational Sciences of the National Institutes of Health under Award Number KL2TR000431. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, The University of Chicago, 5841 South Maryland Avenue MC 2050, Chicago, IL, 60637, USA

    Julie Chor & Melissa Gilliam

  2. The MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics, The University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA

    Julie Chor

  3. The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA

    Megan Tusken

  4. Illinois Perinatal Quality Collaborative, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, USA

    Danielle Young

  5. Los Angeles LGBT Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Phoebe Lyman

Authors
  1. Julie Chor
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  2. Megan Tusken
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  3. Danielle Young
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  4. Phoebe Lyman
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  5. Melissa Gilliam
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Julie Chor.

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Chor, J., Tusken, M., Young, D. et al. Factors Shaping Women’s Pre-abortion Communication with Members of Their Social Network. J Community Health 44, 265–271 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10900-018-0582-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10900-018-0582-1

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