ArticleQuality of life research : an international journal of quality of life aspects of treatment, care and rehabilitation2014
Does abortion reduce self-esteem and life satisfaction?
Article in Quality of life research : an international journal of quality of life aspects of treatment, care and rehabilitation, 2014. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 12 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
12 citing papers in PubMed.
- Concurrent depression and anxiety in women undergoing additional diagnostic procedures due to positive screening for cervical cancer.PloS one · 2026Observational
- Examining psychometric screening scores for depression, anxiety, and posttraumatic stress after fetal KCL injection.Pregnancy (Hoboken, N.J.) · 2025Article
- Women's reproductive mental health: currently available evidence and future directions for research, clinical practice and health policy.World psychiatry : official journal of the World Psychiatric Association (WPA) · 2025Article
- Progesterone-mediated reversal of mifepristone-induced pregnancy termination in a rat model: an exploratory investigation.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- A Cohort Study of Mental Health Services Utilization Following a First Pregnancy Abortion or Birth.International journal of women's health · 2023Article
- Collapse of the Abortion Care Infrastructure: There Aren't Enough Hands to Fill the Gaps.American journal of public health · 2022Article
- The Turnaway Study: A Case of Self-Correction in Science Upended by Political Motivation and Unvetted Findings.Frontiers in psychology · 2022Review
- Abortion as empowerment: reproductive rights activism in a legally restricted context.BMC pregnancy and childbirth · 2017Article
- Unintended Pregnancy, Induced Abortion, and Mental Health.Current psychiatry reports · 2017Review
- The Implications of Unintended Pregnancies for Mental Health in Later Life.American journal of public health · 2016Article
- Decision Rightness and Emotional Responses to Abortion in the United States: A Longitudinal Study.PloS one · 2015Article
- Differences in abortion attitudes by policy context and between men and women in the World Values Survey.Women & healthArticle
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
Abstract
purposeThis study aims to assess the effects of obtaining an abortion versus being denied an abortion on self-esteem and life satisfaction.
methodsWe present the first 2.5 years of a 5-year longitudinal telephone-interview study that follows 956 women who sought an abortion from 30 facilities across the USA. We examine the self-esteem and life satisfaction trajectories of women who sought and received abortions just under the facility's gestational age limit, of women who sought and received abortions in their first trimester of pregnancy, and of women who sought abortions just beyond the facility gestational limit and were denied an abortion. We use adjusted mixed effects linear regression analyses to assess whether the trajectories of women who sought and obtained an abortion differ from those who were denied one.
resultsWomen denied an abortion initially reported lower self-esteem and life satisfaction than women who sought and obtained an abortion. For all study groups, except those who obtained first trimester abortions, self-esteem and life satisfaction improved over time. The initially lower levels of self-esteem and life satisfaction among women denied an abortion improved more rapidly reaching similar levels as those obtaining abortions at 6 months to one year after abortion seeking. For women obtaining first trimester abortions, initially higher levels of life satisfaction remained steady over time.
conclusionsThere is no evidence that abortion harms women's self-esteem or life satisfaction in the short term.
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Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.