Measuring Pregnancy Planning and the Effect of Childhood Abuse on Reproductive Health

• The London Measure of Unplanned Pregnancy (LMUP) and the Swedish Pregnancy Planning Scale (SPPS) are two measurements of pregnancy planning. Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and childhood abuse are stressful events that have been suggested to have both short- and long-term effects.Study I investigated the psychometric properties of the LMUP and the SPPS and compared their assessments. Questionnaire data from 2,314 pregnant women showed medium-high construct validity and high test-retest reliability for both measurements. The convergent validity of LMUP was low. The assessments of the LMUP and the SPPS corresponded substantially.Study II explored how the SPPS was interpreted and what women considered when responding to it. Twenty-five pregnant women were interviewed. Women responding to the SPPS took into account their life situation, intentions, desires, timing, actions to prepare for, or avoid, pregnancy, having discussed becoming pregnant with their partner, and reactions after learning of the pregnancy.Study III analysed the association between ACEs and pregnancy-related pain. Pregnant women (n = 142) responded to questionnaires in early and late pregnancy, respectively, and reported their pain intensities and pain distributions. Greater exposure to ACEs was associated with higher pain distribution and women exposed to ACEs reported higher worst pain intensities compared to non-exposed.Study IV investigated effects of childhood emotional, physical and sexual abuse on pregnancy planning. The effect of a potential collider-stratification bias were also studied. Questionnaire data from 76,197 pregnant Norwegian women showed separate but no joint effects of the categories on having an unplanned pregnancy and a collider-stratification bias could not explain the effects.The LMUP and the SPPS measure somewhat different aspects of pregnancy planning and there is a substantial agreement between their assessments. Both the LMUP and the SPPS showed good validity and test-retest reliability. However, the LMUP would likely benefit from item reduction and the SPPS poorly captures any health-related changes made in and the preconception period.The results suggest that childhood abuse and ACEs have an effect on pregnancy planning and pregnancy-related pain. The findings suggest that preventing child abuse could have a positive effect on later reproductive health.

Nyckelord

pregnancy planning

unplanned pregnancy

childhood abuse

adverse childhood experiences

reproductive health

Obstetrik och gynekologi

Obstetrics and Gynaecology

Publikations- och innehållstyp

vet (ämneskategori)

dok (ämneskategori)