Word: clayson
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Unwanted pregnancy" is a widely accepted term among both laymen and behavioral scientists. It is also widely misunderstood, according to Cornell University Psychiatrist Lawrence Downs and Psychologist David Clayson. In a paper presented to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, Downs and Clayson offer convincing evidence that among women who have abortions, pregnancy is initially "more wanted than unwanted." Far from being accidental, it represents a subconscious effort to cope with extreme emotional stress...
Downs and Clayson reached their conclusions after studying 108 patients at New York Hospital. Most of the women were well informed about birth control, and many had sometimes practiced it at some time in their lives. Then why, the investigators wondered, did such women get pregnant...
These percentages are the first statistical evidence that most abortion patients have conceived while under exceptional emotional stress. The results seem to support the widely accepted psychiatric belief that pregnancy is seldom a chance occurrence. Thus, Downs and Clayson conclude, the women they studied had unconsciously "chosen" pregnancy as a way of repairing "a threatened or damaged psyche." They needed their supposedly unwanted pregnancies, at least for a while, "to prove something to themselves"-perhaps that they were truly feminine, or that they were whole enough to create, or that they need not be entirely alone...
...facts is that despite the widespread availability of the Pill and other means of birth control, so many unwanted pregnancies happen, even among the most educated and sophisticated. Subconsciously, many may want to become pregnant, according to Dr. Lawrence Downs, a Manhattan psychiatrist, who, in collaboration with Psychologist David Clayson, has been studying women selected at random at New York Hospital's therapeutic-abortion ward. Downs found that at least one-quarter of the first 108 women studied had suffered psychiatric problems in the previous two years; more than half had lost a parent or close relative during...