“We stick with labels a lot. Tey create comfort zones, but they also create barriers.” –June How Americans Understand Abortion a comprehensive interview study of abortion attitudes in the u.s. tricia c. bruce, phd MCGRATH INSTITUTE FOR CHURCH LIFE 2020 research team Tricia C. Bruce, PhD (PI) Bridget Ritz, MA Maureen Day, PhD Kendra Hutchens, PhD Patricia Tevington, PhD Executive Summary Tis report summarizes major fndings from the In the full report, Part One (“A Spectrum of Attitudes”) largest known in-depth interview study of “everyday” explores how Americans talk about abortion’s morality Americans’ attitudes toward abortion. Prior studies and legality, beyond the confnes of survey questions. have been limited by fxed-choice survey questions or It summarizes themes from the “oppositional edge,” narrow samples of Americans (e.g., only activists or i.e., Americans most strongly against abortion morally those with abortion experience). Tis study instead or legally; the “permissive edge,” i.e., Americans not engaged a diverse cross-section of American adults in morally opposed or most supportive of legality; and the comprehensive one-on-one interviews averaging “ambivalent,” i.e., Americans conficted about abortion’s seventy-fve minutes, with questions designed to morality or legality. Part Two (“Wells of Meaning”) elicit open-ended thoughts, feelings, and experiences explores fve of the most salient sources Americans draw connected to abortion attitudes. upon when talking through and explaining their attitudes toward abortion: abortion experience, parenthood, facts, A team of fve sociologists led by Tricia C. Bruce, religion, and politics. Part Tree (“Te Limits of Labels”) PhD, conducted 217 in-depth interviews across six describes perceptions and contradictions that underlie states (California, Colorado, Indiana, North Dakota, the terms “pro-choice” and “pro-life,” with implications Pennsylvania, and Tennessee) between March and for collaboration and activism. Part Four (“A Diferent August 2019. Te political and demographic Conversation”) summarizes major takeaways and their characteristics of the interview sample approximate implications for how to facilitate a more empathetic, diversity across the US adult population overall. productive public conversation about abortion. Interviewees were selected via a random address-based mailing combined with targeted recruitment to balance quotas. Abortion was not disclosed as the topic during initial recruitment. Interviews were recorded, transcribed, coded thematically, and analyzed for meaningful patterns. Major Findings 1. Americans don’t talk much about abortion. Moreover, labels do not hold the same meaning for Most interviewees had never talked about abortion in those who identify with them, evoking inconsistent depth. Te silence surrounding abortion is a partial legal and moral views. Many hesitate to adopt any label consequence of the shouting that surrounds it publicly. given negative associations. Americans bristle at public Interviewees express fear that talking will incite caricatures of common abortion attitude labels—both confict, despite the promises so many articulate not those they adhere to and those they do not. Stereotypes, to “judge” another. Interviews also reveal that most misnomers, and perceptions of hypocrisy discourage Americans have not given careful thought to abortion, conversation and activism. Labels are often polarizing, beyond how labels, politics, and media frame public oversimplifying, and inaccurate for how everyday conversations. Wells of meaning are deep, but they are Americans actually think and feel about abortion. typically unexamined. Most Americans don’t know for themselves what they believe about abortion. Many fnd 4. Abortion talk concerns as much what happens themselves bereft of scientifc, legal, and moral lexicons before and after as it does abortion itself. to reason through difcult topics, working with a limited set of facts and tools in moral reasoning. Americans focus much of their attention on abortion’s preconditions, alternatives, and afterefects. Views toward abortion connect to questions regarding the 2. Survey statistics oversimplify Americans’ nature of the relationship between conceiving partners, abortion attitudes. pregnancy prevention, fnancial or relational support, Abortion attitudes are more complex than survey health, parenthood, adoption feasibility, and much more. statistics suggest. Survey summaries can be misleading Opinions on myriad social issues and corollary personal and should be interpreted with caution. Many decisions frame attitudes well beyond the procedural interviewees gave us an initial answer to a survey-style “yes/no” or “right/wrong” of an abortion decision. question before disclosing that that’s not really how they feel. Surveys miss the ways that Americans ofer 5. Americans ponder a “good life” as much disclaimers and caveats, contradict themselves, hedge as they do “life.” their responses, change their minds, and think through things in real time. Most Americans, moreover, do not Interviewees raise questions about whether and when hold bipolar views toward abortion but multidimensional life exists through talk of conception, development, ones, requiring well-attuned survey instruments that viability, the onset of given traits, medical intervention, can measure limits, exceptions, rationales, and broader and abortion timing. But just as commonly, interviewees contexts informing abortion attitudes. ponder the essentials of a “good life” for the baby or parent(s). A “good life,” it would seem, includes health, support, fnancial stability, afection, rights, and pursuit 3. Position labels are imprecise substitutes for of chosen livelihoods. Americans deliberate these “good actual views toward abortion. life” cornerstones as much as they do those marking the onset of life. Interviewees who were legally permissive of Mutually exclusive labels like “pro-choice” and “pro- abortion were more likely to privilege a “good life” than life” ft Americans and the abortion issue imperfectly, at they were to debate the bioethical terms of a person. best. Tey signal extremes and belief consistency, when Choosing a “good life” becomes, for some, a good most Americans hold neither extreme nor consistent enough reason to have an abortion. beliefs toward abortion. Presented with a scale from 1 (“most pro-choice”) to 10 (“most pro-life”), two-thirds of interviewees chose something between 1 and 10. Recommendations 6. Abortion is not merely political to everyday A diferent kind of conversation on abortion can both Americans, but intimately personal. clarify and complicate personal views, generating Public conversation treats abortion as an abstract opportunities for more common ground. Te occasion political construct more than the intimately personal for conversation is an occasion for refecting upon one it is in reality to everyday Americans. One-quarter one’s own thinking and for listening to that of another. of our female interviewees disclosed personal abortion Bringing abortion conversation out from the quiet and histories; three-quarters of interviewees knew someone away from the shouting is in itself a way forward. Te personally who has had an abortion. Abortion is not a following recommendations emerge from our study’s hypothetical exercise in ideology or doctrinal adherence, fndings, presented in the interest of a more productive but a lived and often fraught experience. Abortion public deliberation about abortion and its personal and stories also don’t ft neatly into scenarios imagined by social consequences: surveys or conjured when arguing the merits of a given position. Personal relationships alter attitudes toward • Americans can talk about abortion under the right abortion, as do experiences with infertility, pregnancy, conditions, are more inclined to enter conversations miscarriage, adoption, and abortion. Abortion touches than debates, and would beneft from expanded not only distant others but neighbors, coworkers, education in science, law, and moral reasoning. family, and friends. • Americans can enter conversations about abortion wary of survey statistics summarizing views on abortion’s morality and legality, which are incomplete 7. Americans don’t “want” abortion. and misleading. None of the Americans we interviewed talked about • Americans can enter conversations about abortion by abortion as a desirable good. Views range in terms of provisionally setting aside “pro-choice” and “pro-life” abortion’s preferred availability, justifcation, or need, labels and the perceptions they carry. but Americans do not uphold abortion as a happy event or something they want more of. Attitudinal diferences • Americans can enter conversations about abortion about abortion’s morality and legality do not diminish around abortion, through talk of relationships, the weightiness of abortion’s impact in real life, on real economics, health, parenthood, social support, jobs, people. Acknowledging this does not resolve to a legal inequality, and more. position, but makes room for humanity and for talking • Americans can enter conversations about abortion about hard things. on common ground to support positive long-term outcomes for pregnant women, their conceiving partners, and children. • Americans can enter conversations about abortion seeing the issue as one that impacts not only politics, strangers, and distant others, but those closest to them. • Americans can enter conversations about abortion with the common