“Turnaround” in Abortion Views
An extensive study of abortion views is highlighting a sea change in attitudes in the past 15 years.
Over 30,000 survey interviews were conducted in the state between 1992 and 2006. Participants were asked: “On the debate over abortion policy, do you consider yourself to be pro-life, pro-choice or somewhere in between?” Those who gave a definitive answer were then asked how strongly they held their view.
Results in 1992 were largely in step with what study authors Christopher Blunt and Fred Steeper call the “self-interest hypothesis.” Women and men under 30 were the most ardently “pro-choice” (39 percent) and the least likely to be strongly “pro-life”( 23 percent).
Today, by contrast, among the current generation of 18- to 29-year-olds, 36 percent say they are strongly “pro-life,” while just 18 percent say they are strongly “pro-choice,” the study authors said.
The trend was particularly evident among women in that age bracket. Forty 40 percent identify themselves as strongly “pro-life” and only 20 percent as strongly “pro-choice.”
The data reverses a two-to-one ratio that was evident in 1992, the study noted.
Technorati Tags: abortion, Overbrook Research, Christopher Blunt, Fred Steeper
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