Gender linked fate explains lower legal abortion support among white married women

Linked fate among underrepresented groups: Investigating the relationships between Black college students' perceptions of institutional diversity climate and mental health

Objective: Negative perceptions of institutional racial climate relate to worse mental health outcomes for Black college students. Yet, few scholars have considered how Black students' perceptions of the institutional climate for other underrepresented groups may impact mental health. Participants and Methods: We drew on a national sample of Black college students across 15 institutions (n = 1188) to examine the effects of institutional diversity climate on students' anxiety, depression, and positive mental health. Results: Black students who perceived the campus as more welcoming to first-generation reported higher positive mental health. Black students who perceived the campus as more welcoming to racial minorities, lesbian, gay, bisexual (LGB), and low socioeconomic status (SES) students reported lower levels of depression and anxiety. Conclusions: Black students' perceptions of the institutional diversity climate for other groups influences their mental health outcomes, and underscores the need for more research on individual-level differences in students' mental health processes.

Individual changes in abortion knowledge and attitudes

RATIONALE

Policymakers need to know the abortion attitudes of those they represent. In addition, inaccurate knowledge of or negative attitudes toward abortion may lead to more abortion stigma, which may adversely affect abortion access and women's health.

OBJECTIVE

The first objective was to examine whether individual's abortion knowledge and attitudes changed during 2016-2020 in Delaware and Maryland. The second was to explore whether personally knowing someone who had an abortion in 2020 was associated with knowledge, attitudes, and changes in them from 2016 to 2020.

METHODS

Data were from the Delaware [Maryland] Survey of Women, a probability sample that was self-administered via web and mail (N = 1106). Women aged 18-44 from Delaware and Maryland were followed from 2016/2017 to 2019/2020. Outcomes were each two facets of abortion knowledge (perceived safety and perceived access) and abortion attitudes (acceptability and advocacy self-identification), and changes in these outcomes. The main predictor was whether women personally knew someone who had an abortion. Covariates included state, religiosity, pregnancy history, and sociodemographic factors. We used logistic models with inverse probability weights.

RESULTS

The percentage of respondents who changed between the first and third waves varied: 46% changed their views on safety and accessibility; 21% changed their views on acceptability; and 25% changed their advocacy self-identification. Knowing someone personally who had an abortion was associated with changing toward viewing abortion as very safe and towards pro-choice, and with not changing towards viewing abortion as wrong or identifying as pro-life.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings suggest abortion knowledge and attitudes are not fixed but change over time, and knowing someone who had an abortion or having an abortion oneself was associated with changing toward positive attitudes and accurate knowledge. Sharing one's abortion experience with others one knows may reduce negative attitudes and inaccurate knowledge regarding abortion.