Unwanted conception: research on undesirable consequences.

Abstract

Literature is reviewed which bears on the general hypothesis that unwanted conceptions have undesirable results for parents and children. In a large national probability sample, 17% of all white couples were classified as having excess fertility. Among couples married 10 years or more, 23% had excess fertility. Among nonwhites, 31% of all couples and 48% living on Southern farms had excess fertility. The hypothesis is raised that pregnant mothers' conscious or unconscious anger and upsetness during pregnancy make them more liable to the psychosomatic disturbance than mothers following conceptions that are not unwanted. Studies have been mixed in supporting the hypothesis. Psychological factors may, in some cases, lead to spontaneous abortions. No systematic research has been found that demonstrates a relationship between unwanted conception and spontaneous abortion although such a possibility seems plausible. There is little direct evidence of a link between unwanted conception and labor and delivery problems. The negative consequences of induced abortion provide a clear argument for attempting to avoid unwanted conception. Current views regard parapartum psychoses as cynamically similar to emotional upheavals at any time. Of 212 wives, those who reported having deliberately tried to avoid conception recalled significantly more emotional upset during the first trimester of pregnancy but similar differences were not present for later trimesters nor the period since childbirth. Although there is a contention that unwanted conceptions tend to have undesirable effects, direct evidence of such a relationship is almost completely lacking, except for a few fragments of retrospective evidence. This is primarily because there is little decisive reserach, rather than because of negative feelings.