INDUCED ELECTIVE ABORTION AND PERINATAL GRIEF (ABORTION).
Contributors: New York University.
Published: 1991
Number of pages: 124
Subjects: Health Sciences, Nursing.
Description: This study investigated whether or not women who had undergone induced elective abortion experienced perinatal grief. The theoretical rationale is based upon Lindemann's (1944) grief theory.

The participants in the sample consisted of 83 women who were recruited from outpatient clinics, family planning agencies, women's health service agencies and through individual health care provider referrals in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, Tennessee, Texas and Vermont and whose mean time since abortion was a mean of 11.0 years with a range of less than one year to 26 years. The Grief Experience Inventory (GEI/Form B) was utilized as an objective measure of the multi-dimensional aspects of grief. The GEI (Form B) is a 104 item questionnaire which consists of 3 Validity Scales, 6 Bereavement Scales and 6 Research Scales, which are standardized scales representing separate components of grief and yield 15 scores. A GEI profile was constructed for the participants from the mean raw scores and mean T-scores to provide a pictorial representation of the study sample.

The major finding was that women who had undergone induced elective abortion experienced perinatal grief as evidenced by T-scores $>$50 on 7 of the 12 GEI (Form B) scales: anger and/or hostility (AH), withdrawal from social contacts and responsibilities (SI), inability to control overt emotional experience (LC), heightened personal death awareness (DA), loss or lack of physical strength (SVI), preoccupation with bodily symptoms (SP) and the need to depend on others (Dep). Intensity of perinatal grief was minimal as revealed by the slight elevations ($>$50) on the GEI (Form B) scales.

A clinical implication of this study is that some women experience persistence of various aspects of perinatal grief for long periods of time following abortion.
Notes: Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 53-03, Section: B, page: 1296.

Thesis (PH.D.)--NEW YORK UNIVERSITY, 1991.

School code: 0146.