Award Title: Pride and Prejudice: The experiences of young donor-conceived adults in the UK
Funder: Economic and Social Research Council

Abstract: This multidisciplinary, multi-method, multi-phase study will answer four key research questions:

RQ1: How do young donor-conceived adults construct their social identities, and what are their lived experiences?
RQ2: How does the experience of being donor-conceived manifest differently at the intersection of different social identities?
RQ3: What are the factors that contribute to well-being among young donor-conceived adults?
RQ4: Are the pathways to well-being distinct for young adults who are donor-conceived compared to those who are conceived in more traditional circumstances?

Its key scientific objectives will be to:

1. Explore how young adults conceived through sperm donation construct their social identities in relation to their conception, to gain an insight into their lived experiences, and to understand how these experiences relate to other social status differences (i.e. socioeconomic status, gender, race/ethnicity) amongst donor-conceived young adults raised in different family types, through in-depth interviews, focus groups and secondary analysis of conference panel discussions;

2. Understand the similarities and differences between young donor-conceived adults and young adults conceived in more traditional circumstances on a range of previously unexplored positive psychological and social dimensions, testing a theoretically and empirically informed model comprised of robust questionnaire measures;

3. Generate a series of academic outputs that break new empirical and theoretical ground in the social scientific scholarship on donor conception, including at least four articles to be published in high-quality, internationally reputable academic journals in the social sciences, and two presentations at the most relevant and reputable national and international conferences for the proposed project.

The non-scientific objectives of the project relate primarily to its pathways to impact, which have been planned to reflect the needs of young donor-conceived adults, for whom empirically informed resources are currently non-existent. As such, the primary non-scientific objectives of this research will be to:

4.(a) Engage with community stakeholders (Donor Conception Network, DCN) to produce three non-academic outputs relating to young donor-conceived adults' perspectives. These are:
(i) A research page on the DCN website, to include a short film about the project findings; 
(ii) A resource for prospective and current parents of donor-conceived children, to ensure that the beneficiaries of the project are not only those who engage with DCN;
(iii) A resource for secondary school teachers, to influence educational activities relating to donor conception.

4.(b) Begin to develop a partnership between academic and non-academic stakeholders that will inform future research, achieved through:
(i) Consultation and capacity-building with DCN;
(ii) Creating opportunities for dialogue and knowledge exchange between key stakeholders through an end-of-project conference.

Finally, it is anticipated that this research will significantly positively impact upon my future academic trajectory. Its fifth objective is thus to:

5. Provide opportunities for training in research methods and advanced analytical techniques, and opportunities for the development of management skills; the time to research, to publish in high-impact academic journals, and to share findings with other academics at national and international conferences; and the space to work with and learn from an Advisory Group and a community group, and to develop new networks in both academic and non-academic domains.

Lay Abstract: The number of children conceived using donated gametes in the UK is consistently increasing each year. As diverse paths to parenthood become increasingly well-trodden, gaining greater scientific understanding of the experiences and outcomes of those who are donor-conceived is vital. Building upon my previous research on the perspectives of donor-conceived children and adolescents, the proposed research will investigate the experiences and outcomes of donor-conceived young adults, a group that has yet to be the focus of systematic study. Understanding the experiences and outcomes of those who are donor-conceived as they move into adulthood is important, not least because it is now generally established that it is during the ages of 18-25 that people develop a real sense of who they are and where they belong. The proposed project will therefore investigate the importance and impact of donor conception on the identities, experiences and well-being of young adults. It will seek to understand how those who are donor-conceived navigate the social world at this particular stage in their development: from attending freshers' week events at university, to attending regular check-ups at the doctors. 

The proposed research aims to address these issues by using a range of social scientific theories and methods that will put the perspectives of donor-conceived young adults at the forefront of the research agenda. Collecting data from 240 participants in total, including donor-conceived young adults and a control group of those conceived in more traditional circumstances, the research will employ both qualitative and quantitative methods that together allow for both the in-depth investigation of individual experiences, and group comparisons on a range of as yet unstudied psychological and social dimensions. The project has been designed to address the concerns raised about the representative nature of previous research on donor-conceived adults, which has either collected data from individuals who found out about their conception in challenging circumstances and feel negatively about this, or administered questionnaires to individuals registered on online platforms for identifying genetic relatives. The proposed research will also significantly extend the knowledge gained from previous studies of the psychological well-being of donor-conceived children and adolescents, which do not provide information on later development. Finally, the proposed research will move beyond previous scholarship that has primarily focussed on within-family factors. This is important, because little is yet known about the relationship between the social experiences of donor-conceived people and their well-being, although studies of the social climate indicate that donor conception remains socially stigmatised, and research on other topics has highlighted the negative consequences of such stigma for psychological health.

This research has been designed in consultation with the Donor Conception Network, the first and largest community-based network in the UK for donor conception families. Beyond being of significant scientific merit, the proposed research therefore responds to the needs of the donor conception community in general, and to the needs of donor-conceived young adults in particular. In 2023, the first cohort of young donor-conceived adults will reach the age at which they can legally identify the donors involved in their conception. Developing appropriate mechanisms to support these young adults through donor identifiability clearly requires an initial understanding of what it is like to be a young donor-conceived adult in Britain today. The proposed research will thus generate novel, and timely, insights that will not only lead to scientific discoveries that are of clear general interest, but will also inform the development of important resources that will benefit people conceived using donated gametes, both now, and in the future.

Research Activity Codes: 1.2 PSYCHOLOGICAL AND SOCIOECONOMIC PROCESSES
Health Categories: GENERIC HEALTH RELEVANCE