The broad objective of the proposed research, which represents the fourth wave in an ongoing, longitudinal study, is to increase our understanding of the effect that pregnancy wantedness has on human life-span development. Specifically, it aims to collect psychological and behavioral data from a sample of 220 males and females born during 1961-63 in Prague, Czechoslovakia to women twice denied an abortion for the same pregnancy (UP subjects) and 220 pair matched controls whose mothers had accepted their pregnancies (AP subjects). Additional data will be collected from the siblings of both the UP and AP subjects (SUP and SAP subjects). Data will be collected both directly from the subjects by interviews, questionnaires, inventories, and rating scales and from official registers for criminal activity, alcohol and drug abuse, and social welfare intervention. Two hypotheses will be tested; namely that adult individuals from originally unwanted pregnancies manifest greater social deviancy and worse psychological adjustment than their matched controls and that these indicators of maladaptation result at least in part from the specific effects of unwantedness as opposed to confounding hereditary and familial influences. A regression model that includes variables controlling for age, sex, and birth order effects will be used to explore these hypotheses. Additional analyses will explore the effect of unwantedness on only children and test for the possibility of attrition effects.
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| Kubicka, Ludyyc; Roth, Zdenyyc; Dytrych, Zdenyyc et al. (2002) The mental health of adults born of unwanted pregnancies, their siblings, and matched controls: a 35-year follow-up study from Prague, Czech Republic. J Nerv Ment Dis 190:653-62 |
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| David, H P (1994) Reproductive rights and reproductive behavior. Clash or convergence of private values and public policies? Am Psychol 49:343-9 |
