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Mapping People’s Views Regarding Childbearing Among People with Learning Difficulties

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Abstract

The study mapped French people’s views regarding childbearing among persons with learning difficulties. Participants were members of the community aged 18–84. Some of them had a solid grounding in law or had medical training or were psychologists or remedial education workers. They were presented with 48 realistic stories that were composed according to a four-factor within-subject design: level of learning difficulty (light vs. severe) × level of help to be expected from the family (stable, well-to-do family vs. single-parent family with socio-economic problems) × stability of the relationship (stable, long-term relationship, stable short-term relationship or episodic relationship) × partner (no learning difficulties vs. light difficulties) × parents’ attitude (did not oppose their daughter’s project vs. unfavourable). Several additional stories were added to the main design, in which etiology was genetic (Down’s syndrome). Participants were asked to judge the “reasonableness” of both partners’ decision in each case. Through cluster analysis, four qualitatively different positions were found. They were called Never Reasonable (34 % of the sample, mostly lawyers and self-identified rightists), Depends on Circumstances (50 %, mostly male participants), Depends on Stability of Relationship (9 %), and Quite Reasonable (8 %, mostly participants younger than 26).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Jean-Jaurès University, Toulouse, France

    Elodie Pajot, Maria Teresa Muñoz Sastre & Mathilde Nacher

  2. Institute of Advanced Studies, Paris, France

    Etienne Mullet

  3. 17 bis, rue de Quefes, 31830, Plaisance, France

    Etienne Mullet

Authors
  1. Elodie Pajot
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  2. Maria Teresa Muñoz Sastre
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  3. Mathilde Nacher
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  4. Etienne Mullet
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Correspondence to Etienne Mullet.

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Conflict of interest

Elodie Pajot, Maria Teresa Muñoz Sastre, Mathilde Nacher and Etienne Mullet declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical Approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Informed Consent

Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Pajot, E., Muñoz Sastre, M.T., Nacher, M. et al. Mapping People’s Views Regarding Childbearing Among People with Learning Difficulties. Sex Disabil 33, 447–456 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11195-015-9420-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11195-015-9420-x

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