“I actually like children very much”: The false dichotomization of abortion provision and motherhood

Exploring the Relationship between Abortion Provision and Providers' Personal Pregnancy and Parenting Experiences

OBJECTIVE

Support for abortion rights is often portrayed as antithetical to valuing family. With abortion provider demographics trending toward younger and female physicians, we sought to understand the influence of personal experiences with parenthood and pregnancy on abortion provision.

STUDY DESIGN

We surveyed U.S. physicians who have provided abortions, recruited from listservs and online groups. We calculated descriptive statistics using Stata SE. We used an inductive editing approach in coding free-text responses to questions about the emotional and experiential interplay between pregnancy, parenthood, and abortion provision, iteratively developing and refining a codebook, and ultimately identifying common themes.

RESULTS

We collected qualitative data from 227 participants, the majority of whom were under age 40 (51.1%), female (93.0%), and OB/GYN physicians (75.8%). Qualitative analysis yielded four main themes. 1) Providers feel dissonance between the societal expectation of conflict between abortion provision and parenthood and their lived experiences. 2) Abortion providers' personal experiences with pregnancy and parenthood increase compassion and stimulate a stronger therapeutic bond. 3) Pregnant abortion providers are sometimes affected by the contrast between ending one pregnancy while advancing another; however, most providers are able to contextualize their patients' need for abortion separately from their feelings about their own pregnancies and children. 4) Providers feel their abortion work positively impacts their parenting.

CONCLUSIONS

Our research demonstrates multiple effects of the interplay between abortion providers' personal reproductive experiences and their abortion provision, with a mutually positive overall relationship between parenting and abortion provision. Exploring this interaction could help to decrease stigma toward both abortion and abortion providers.

'Removed from humanity': a qualitative analysis of attitudes toward abortion providers in anti-abortion individuals in Canada

OBJECTIVE

The present study explores the content of abortion provider stigma.

BACKGROUND

Abortion stigma extends beyond women who have abortions to abortion providers. Previous analyses of anti-abortion bills and rhetoric have revealed stereotypes of abortion providers as dangerous and less trustworthy than other health professionals.

METHODS

We present a thematic analysis of one-on-one interviews about attitudes toward abortion providers with Canadian individuals (N = 21) holding an anti-abortion stance.

RESULTS

We found participants held two kinds of beliefs about abortion providers: (1) providers are agentic and intentional actors and (2) providers are non-agentic victims of a larger system. While the former subtype of provider was viewed with hostility and disgust, the latter was viewed with pity, with participants suggesting that restriction of abortion would be beneficial for provider well-being.

CONCLUSION

We document a new component of abortion provider stigma: the belief that abortion providers are harmed by abortion and that they are to be pitied for this. This 'abortion harms providers' attitude parallels recent anti-abortion arguments that abortion harms women. These stigmatising attitudes both construct the provider as untrustworthy and unable to properly care for women.